Broken Connections
by Gamebird
Summary: Set at the end of season 4, but The Wall never happened. Sylar broke out of Matt's mind trap without anyone's help. Yet Peter still needs him – in more ways than he'll admit.
1. In Pieces

**Title:** Broken Connections (this chapter: In Pieces)  
**Characters:** Peter and Sylar as main characters. Strong contributions by Claire Bennet, Audrey Hanson, and Amanda Strazzula. Cameos by Dead Matt Parkman, Emma Coolidge, Aviv, and Pearl. Angela Petrelli and Noah Bennet phone in their performances.  
**Rating:** NC-17  
**Warnings: **Graphic sexual content, mild gore, sex with dubious degrees of consent  
**Words:** Around 40,000 in nine chapters  
**Summary: **The Wall never happened. Sylar broke out of Matt's mind trap without anyone's help. But Peter still needs him – in more ways than he'll admit.  
**Notes:** Written for dakotaliar on Tumblr, inspired by the beautiful fanvid 'In Pieces' by Vaeltaa (on YouTube as user OfNightside). All chapters are from Peter's POV except chapter 2 and the last one. My deep thanks to means2bhuman for beta reading this for me and offering excellent suggestions and encouragement!

* * *

Peter knew something was wrong when the door to Matt Parkman's house silently swung inward, without any apparent cause. He'd knocked. A moment before it had been closed and locked, but not now. One breath later, he smelled the blood. He swallowed hard and tried to control the sudden pounding of his heart. Fear and adrenaline coursed through him, but neither of those would help. He was here to get Sylar. His mother, the dream he'd had – neither had told him how things would be when he found him, just that he would find him, and doing so would save Emma and everyone else at the carnival. Marshaling his courage, he took a slow, careful step inside … then another.

The smell was stronger. It made the air feel thick in his lungs, unnaturally moist. He rounded the edge of the sofa to see Sylar squatting next to the source – Matt Parkman, dead. The top of Matt's head was gone. Parts of his brain looked mangled. Warm blood was still seeping out to saturate the carpet. It coated Sylar's hands, making them slick and tacky, red to the wrists where it stained the cuffs of his white shirt. Peter swallowed back bile. He couldn't imagine how this man would save the carnival. _Perhaps by killing Emma?_ The thought turned his stomach.

"Hello, Peter."

"Sylar," Peter said back automatically, though he was in no mood to exchange polite greetings. The last time he'd seen this person in the flesh had been a few nights ago when Sylar had saluted him as he sauntered away from Mercy Hospital. It had been Peter's final attempt at saving Nathan. Looking at Matt's corpse, or at Sylar, sickened him. He glanced around the room instead, realizing with a hideous lurch in his gut that there was a playpen in the center of the living room. A teddy bear lay at the edge of the darkening carpet, the bottom of its golden fur gradually blackening.

"Fancy seeing you here," Sylar quipped.

"There was a child," Peter said, his gaze snapping to Sylar's, eyes widening in alarm.

"_Was_."

Peter bristled at the implication Sylar had murdered an innocent child, who couldn't be more than a toddler to judge from the furniture and toys, but he felt so helpless to exact vengeance. His only ability was flight. It was how he'd gotten here, borrowed on short notice from West. He hadn't brought a gun or even a knife. He had only his fists against a man who could regenerate, who had telekinesis, who could slice his throat open from where he squatted on the floor with no more than a thought and a flick of his finger. "Was?" Peter rasped, his voice hollow.

Sylar cocked his head slightly. "And a mother." The smallest smirk played across his lips as he watched Peter react to the news with a faltering step backwards.

Peter struggled with his self control. Fists curled, but attacking Sylar would not help. Maybe there was something he could do for the other victims. He turned to go down the hall, but Sylar's voice caught at him.

"I let them go," Sylar said. He sounded tired.

Peter glanced in the first room he came to – a master bedroom, reasonably tidy. No corpses, at least, or sign of a struggle. Perhaps Sylar was telling the truth. He returned, his piercing eyes demanding answers.

Sylar shrugged as though Peter had spoken. "She had no ability. The boy did, but," he rose to his feet, "I've gone soft."

"Doesn't look that way to me," Peter spat, gesturing at Matt's corpse. He still felt so futile. If he'd only arrived a little earlier, he'd have had a chance to save Matt.

"Don't feel sorry for him," Sylar said curtly. "He tried to lock me in a mental prison for the rest of my existence."

"Looks to me like he had the right idea."

Sylar drew in a deep breath and exhaled, favoring Peter with a withering look that had the opposite effect from his intention. It didn't scare Peter; it just pissed him off. "I came here for _help_," Sylar said petulantly.

"And killing him was supposed to 'help'? Who does that 'help', Sylar?!" Peter didn't even know why he was arguing, but it was the only thing he could do. Calling the cops was dumb – Sylar would cut through them effortlessly. Calling the Company was equally pointless, assuming Peter even knew how to get in touch with them. Rene was on the other side of the continent and trying to snag the right power from Sylar to fight him directly was the riskiest of crapshoots. His mother had known something like this would happen; that must have been why she told him not to go. Matt was already dead. Peter's goal of getting Sylar to save Emma seemed worse than useless now. He might as well fly back to New York empty-handed and see what he could do alone. Maybe there was another way.

Sylar rolled his eyes and interrupted Peter's nascent plans. "Is _everyone_ so self-absorbed? Even you, Peter?"

"What?" The questions didn't follow.

"Listen, you want my help? _I_ need help." Sylar pointed at the middle of his chest with a bloody index finger.

Peter looked at Matt's body. It didn't leave him inclined to feel helpful. Maybe instead of fighting, he could take an ability from Sylar – he had a lot of them – perhaps shape-shifting again, and infiltrate the carnival that way.

"No!" Sylar said sharply, flinging Peter against the nearest wall and pinning him there with telekinesis.

Peter kicked, knocking over a small set of shelves, but accomplishing nothing. His legs under the knee and arms after the elbow were free, as was his head, but the main part of his body was fixed in place as securely as it had been at Thanksgiving, when he'd been forced to sit at the table as Sylar gorged on pumpkin pie and assaulted Peter's mother.

"She deserved it!" Sylar barked.

"What?"

"Never mind." Sylar rubbed his face, leaving it gruesomely smeared with blood. He looked at his hand, his eyes rolled oddly in a psychotic manner, and he raised the other hand to do more of the same on the other cheek and side of his forehead, leaving irregular, crimson streaks. He seemed lost in the horrifying application of war paint, but the telekinetic lock on Peter never wavered.

_He's crazy. Insane. Disturbed. He said he needed help._ In a voice he had to struggle to keep steady, Peter said, "Why did you think Matt was going to help you?"

With gore staining his features, Sylar looked up Peter, mouth gaping in a grin. Disgust and fear twisted Peter's face. Sylar chuckled, an unmistakeable edge of hysteria to the sound. He sat down on the nearby arm of the sofa. Still laughing, he pulled up the arm of his shirt, revealing blank skin. "I had a tattoo." The laughter vanished as his mood shifted, lightning fast. In its place, his voice sounded sad and lost. "It's gone now."

"Was it a compass?" Peter couldn't help but see the connection between his own appearing-disappearing ink.

"No." Sylar's features became intent and he peered at Peter for a long moment.

Peter's eyes snapped to Matt's corpse, realizing what Sylar had done and why some of what he was saying didn't connect with the words spoken aloud. _He's reading my mind!_

"Hm," Sylar hummed. "Took you long enough. I'd always wondered if you were as dense as you seemed. It turns out the answer is: yes." Peter frowned and squirmed, annoyed by the insult, but it was hardly the most important thing going on here. Sylar looked down at the floor for a long moment, before raising his eyes again. "That's actually a good thing for you, Peter. You don't seem to have been _in_ on any of it. I'd thought not. I'd suspected not. That's why I went to you."

"You?" Peter couldn't place when Sylar had come to him for anything good.

"As Nathan," Sylar said patiently.

"Oh." Yeah. He supposed that counted. Sort of. Sylar gave him a queer look. Peter was getting tired of being pinned to the wall like a piece of performance art, 'Italian-American on Display'. The only way he was going to get down was if he played Sylar's game. First he needed to find out what it was. "What did the tattoo have to do with anything?"

"I was told it would lead me to what I wanted most – a connection. First it took me to Claire." Peter tensed, fear coursing through him again. Was she alright? Had she survived whatever Sylar had done to her? Sylar rolled his eyes again. "Calm down. She's fine." When Peter stopped struggling against the hold, he went on, "She wasn't my connection, but I decided perhaps she was just the first step along the path. She said I needed to lose my powers to be human again, so I came here."

"To Matt?"

Sylar nodded. "For a while, when I thought I was Nathan, I didn't know I had these abilities. I thought Parkman could take them away again, make me forget about them, repress them somehow."

Peter relaxed a little, hanging there quietly as he considered what Sylar was saying. Sylar really had been trying to find help. He was willing to lose all of his powers? "And he couldn't, so you killed him?"

"No. He said he could and then he trapped me in that mental prison I mentioned. He tricked me! _That's_ why I killed him."

Calmly, Peter blurted out the truth even though he knew it was dangerous to say, especially in his powerless position. "Sylar, you're a danger to everyone."

"Peter, any perfectly normal human being can buy a gun and go on a rampage. If they so desire, they can poison hundreds, or even thousands, with the investment of only a few hours of research. A few people can organize to fly planes into buildings. I'm sure even worse is possible. _Everyone_ is a danger to _everyone_. For me, it just happens to be easier." He bit his lip hard enough that Peter thought he might have pierced it with his teeth, but between the blood still drying on his face and the regeneration, he couldn't tell a moment later. "Which is why it's even more important than it is for most for me to have reasons _not_ to do that sort of thing."

"Let me down."

Sylar looked at him intently again, then twitched his brows. Peter had no plans of attacking or running – no plans at all. He'd just decided the two of them weren't going to attack each other at the moment, thus there was no reason for the continued annoying, demeaning confinement. Sylar let him go and offered generously, "You could take my ability and then use it to get Parkman's. The body's still warm. You would probably keep the telepathy after swapping mine for something else."

"No, thank you," Peter said, revolted at the very idea. "I've had your ability in the past. It didn't work out." _And in the future, too, I guess._

Sylar shrugged, shrinking a bit on the arm of the sofa as he hunched his shoulders and gave up. "I don't know what else I have to offer the world besides blood, Peter."

_You have regeneration. I'll bet you could give a lot of blood._ But Peter didn't say that. A second later, he realized Sylar had heard it anyway and added the thought, _That was sarcasm._

"I know."

"Good."

"But it's an interesting point. Assuming, of course, none of these abilities have made my blood … unfit."

Peter gave Sylar's hopeless, blood-stained face a long look, thinking about Mohinder telling him how abilities wrought changes on a cellular, even a DNA, level. Peter had gone through the usual regular blood screening as an EMT, but they weren't checking for the sort of things that abilities might do to a person. He didn't know what to say about it, so he nodded and changed the subject. "You said there was a mother and a little boy, right?"

Sylar nodded, still looking at the floor morosely. Peter didn't have any pity for him. It was the Parkmans he felt sorry for and he thought Sylar should, too.

"Are they going to come back here at some point?"

Sylar lifted his head and made a few blinks. "Probably. Everything they own is here."

Peter nodded. "Then get off your butt, Sylar, and quit being so self absorbed. I'm not going to leave her husband's body here for her to find like this. You made the mess. Now help clean it up."

XXX

"So what now?" Sylar asked after they were done.

"Why is what you do next something I need to deal with?" Peter complained as he straightened from returning the crate of cleaning products to their place under the kitchen sink.

"Because you're the only person who's ever helped me, Peter. Genuinely and without any ulterior motive."

"That's because I thought you were my brother at the time. Both times."

"I could be again." Sylar shape-shifted into Nathan. He'd washed his face – doing so had been one of Peter's first directions in the course of cleaning up the place. Sylar had been surprisingly obedient. The second order had been to have Sylar TK the body into the bathtub so it would drain somewhere less messy. Then they cleaned up and removed everything from the living room, including pulling up the carpet and padding, which was currently rolled up in the garage. There was no way to get that much blood out of it – it would have to be disposed of and replaced. They stacked the furniture as neatly as possible on one side of the living room. At the end, they'd taken Matt's body, cleaned him, changed his clothes, replaced the top of his head, and laid him out, wrapped in a sheet in the living room with a few pillows to tilt his body enough to discourage further leakage. Sylar had, rather tackily in Peter's opinion, turned a frying pan to gold and left it prominently on the counter as though it were some kind of ridiculous weregild. Peter had thought as loudly and viciously as possible, '_What you did can't be paid for._' Sylar had said nothing, standing there quietly fondling the skillet until Peter had put away the last of the cleaning supplies.

"Stop that!" Peter snarled, getting angrily into Sylar's Nathan-face. "You aren't my brother! You never were!"

"Our mother said differently." But Sylar shifted back to his normal face anyway.

"She lied!"

"I know."

Peter huffed, glaring at him for a moment, a swift recounting of the most awful things he'd known his mother to do flying through his mind. Sylar … paled. Peter looked away, checking his watch and trying not to think about what it meant for a psychopathic serial killer to be put off by Angela's deeds (or maybe it was by Peter's repressed, impotent rage about them). "I have to be in New York tonight to try and stop whatever's going to happen at the carnival." He went to the back door. The enclosed yard was as good a place as any to take off from.

"I thought you said only I could do that," Sylar said, following him.

"I never said that." Peter moved off the porch and out past the orange tree, looking for a clear patch of sunny California sky.

"You thought it."

"I didn't think it," he snapped irritably, stopping where he intended to launch from. He wasn't fond of having his mind read constantly, though he would grudgingly admit it was occasionally convenient.

Sylar grabbed his arm, preventing him from taking off. "You came here to get me to save people at the carnival. You had a dream I'd do it. That's why you came all the way across the country to find me, against your mother's advice and all common sense."

Peter glared at him. He wasn't going to ask. Come get Sylar – yes. Ask for help from his brother's murderer – no. He'd done the best he could for Matt's family. Now he was needed elsewhere. He peeled Sylar's fingers from his arm and took to the air. Sylar made some exasperated noise and followed him. Peter tried not to think about where Sylar had picked up the power of flight. He just made sure to pour on enough speed as to make conversation impossible.

Within a few steps of landing on the dark, forested edge of Central Park, Sylar was talking to him again, but now he was bargaining. "I won't kill anyone. I promise."

Peter looked at him out of the corner of his eye, unconvinced. Sylar stabbed his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders. It was a good sign, Peter thought, that Sylar seemed to have realized killing people wasn't a good solution to one's problems.

Sylar snorted. "And just what were you planning on doing with all those drugs you had for me at the hospital?"

"If I was planning on killing you," Peter said snippily, "I wouldn't have had all those drugs, now would I?"

"You tried anyway!"

"I was trying to save Nathan."

"You were trying to kill me!"

Peter stopped, turning to face him. "I was _trying to save __**Nathan**_," he said even more emphatically, before bursting out, "Why are we even arguing about this? I wanted you dead for what you'd done. So what? How is that not an understandable reaction to having your _brother _murdered, Sylar?"

"It _is_ understandable, Peter, which is my point. You thought killing someone was a good solution to your problems."

Peter's mouth opened and then shut. _Oh. Yeah. God-damn telepathy!_ "You had it coming!" he finally said, but it sounded like a weak schoolyard comeback, which it was. He stalked off again, following the sidewalk towards the more open areas of the park. Other people were streaming in that direction, so it was probably the right one.

Sylar followed. "And I would like to point out, additionally, that I did not show up at Matt Parkman's house, metaphorical guns blazing. I even submitted myself, entirely, to his mental powers. I allowed him to ..." He made a gun shape of his fingers and held it to his head. "But the idiot thought he could trap me, _me?_, in a time dilation matrix?" Sylar hooted with derisive laughter as they walked. "I restore chronographs for a living, Peter! I can tell that your watch is well-tuned; it only loses a half-second an hour, which is pretty good for a self-winding model, but if you'd let me look at it, I could fix it so it didn't lose or gain time at all, a precision that no one else in the world can match. Did Parkman really think I was going to be fooled by the impression of time passing when it wasn't? Hiro, that Japanese fool, couldn't even stop time when I was involved, not even when his life depended on it!"

"Did you tell him what you were there for? Matt?"

"Yes."

_Well …_ Peter frowned. So Matt had tried to trap him even knowing Sylar wasn't there to do harm. That sucked. And it wasn't like Matt didn't have an ability that let him know if Sylar was being honest or not. "You still shouldn't have killed him."

"Why not?"

"Because you're stronger than he is."

Sylar stopped and blinked at him, confused. "The strong prey upon … that's _exactly_ why I should have killed him."

Peter pulled up as well. People continued past, so intent on fulfilling their summons to the carnival that they completely ignored the heated exchange. "Sylar, you have an obligation to act like a decent human being and not some mindless predator. And that means, just because you're stronger than someone else, you don't hurt them, abuse them, or kill them – _especially_ when you're stronger."

"He was trying to kill _me_."

"And that was wrong. I agree. But just because he did something wrong doesn't mean you should have killed _him_."

"So, just because I killed Nathan doesn't make it right for you to kill me, is that it?"

"Right."

Once again, Sylar was taken aback. "You actually believe that!"

Peter huffed and walked off, heading towards the blinking lights of the carnival. _I never said me wanting to kill you was right. I said it was understandable. _Perhaps telepathy was, in a weird sort of way, the perfect ability for Sylar to get. People _were_ self-absorbed; they actually _did_ believe the things they said; and even so, they weren't a bunch of sociopaths out to get each other. If reading minds was the only way for Sylar to be convinced of that, then fine. Let him read minds. But that was still no justification for killing Matt Parkman.

Sylar trotted after him, shaking his head. "Fine. Like I said, I won't kill anyone!"

"Good."

The night went better than Peter had expected. Sylar didn't actually kill anyone. Peter was thankful that he didn't kill anyone, either. _It's a sorry state of affairs when not killing other people is the bar by which you judge an evening,_ Peter thought sourly, watching as Claire stood up after her swan dive and faced the approaching cameras. Sylar had been saying something profound about how good it felt _not _to have killed anyone. Peter felt supremely unimpressed about that, but he supposed it was an improvement.

"Well," Peter said, "it's over now." He felt angry. He'd been angry for a long time now, but this was bringing it to the surface. Nathan had tried what Claire had just done – to expose the world to specials, to make their presence known. He'd tried it not just once, but twice, and paid for it both times. The world did not tend to respond well to this revelation – as Coyote Sands and Homeland Security could attest. What made Claire think her way would work when all the others had not? Peter snorted and turned away. She hadn't asked his opinion and it was her life to live, but he still had a strong feeling that she'd be the next to need saving.

Sylar fell in behind him, quiet.

"Where do you think you're going?" Peter shot over his shoulder.

"To the last place I slept while in New York."

Peter kept walking, thinking that through. "That was … my apartment. When you were Nathan. Right?" It was possible he'd slept somewhere else in the city after Nathan fell from Mercy Hospital, but if so, Sylar wouldn't have referenced it like Peter would know where he meant.

Sylar made a noncommittal sound.

"Are you … Seriously, you're going to come sleep in my apartment?" Peter glanced back at him. The arrogance! "I didn't even invite you!"

Sylar plodded along behind him anyway. He wouldn't be the one to leave this – whatever it was, between them.

Peter looked forward again, thinking this over. He had the feeling that if he stood up to Sylar and told him to shove off, Sylar would go. He'd leave, and … go somewhere else, where he'd be alone with all his secrets and regrets. Maybe he'd be a menace. That he was coming to Peter's apartment argued either he intended to kill Peter tonight for his ability, or maybe, sadly, he didn't have anywhere else to go. Peter looked back at him again, giving Sylar a nasty look as he considered that first option – the one where Peter didn't wake up in the morning and someone else had to clean up his dead body like they just had for Matt.

"I don't want your ability, Peter," Sylar said quietly.

"Why not?"

"It's not useful to me."

Peter didn't believe that for a moment, despite the truth of the lie. "You have a lot of abilities. Was Ted's ability useful to you? Were you planning on blowing up New York and were just mad I almost beat you to it?"

Sylar made a dry chuckle from where he still walked behind. "No."

"Why don't you want my ability, Sylar?"

Sylar sighed and increased his pace so he was walking alongside Peter instead of trailing him. "Taking your ability would involve killing you and I ..." He didn't go on.

"Say it."

"I don't want to kill you, Peter."

The way Sylar delivered it sounded more like he'd have to kill Peter if he revealed the answer, but it was the answer itself. Peter still wasn't satisfied. He wasn't in the best of moods. The resolution with the carnival had been anticlimactic. It felt unfinished – Samuel was in the custody of the Company, who couldn't be trusted further than Peter could throw them; the carnies had no leader, they'd just been exposed and most likely their way of life was destroyed, along with probably their homes and business; Claire had made things dangerous for everyone, special or not; and here was Sylar, following him home and having not said he wouldn't kill him, just that he didn't want to. It wasn't very comforting.

"Okay. I _won't_ kill you."

"Not tonight, not ever?"

Sylar swallowed and looked uneasy, but he repeated, "Not tonight. Not ever."

Peter eyed him for a moment, but he believed him. It occurred to him he could swap for telepathy now. It would certainly be more useful than terrakinesis. But he liked Sylar knowing that he was going to trust him based on his word alone. It put the burden on Sylar not to change his mind, not to betray that trust. Of course, if he did, Peter would be dead and not around to do anything about it, but Peter didn't value his life very much.

Sylar stared at him as they walked, finally forced to look away to avoid running into a light pole. "You … your life … is very valuable, Peter."

"To whom?"

"Your mother, at least."

"She tried to have me blow up New York. She had my memories wiped and locked me in a container bound for Ireland. I think she might have been complicit in dealing with a future version of me who tried to kill Nathan and stuck me inside some other guy's body. She sent me to kill my dad when I didn't have any powers – an even stupider idea than me going after you today. I'm expendable, Sylar. No one needs me. Nathan was always more important anyway. Now that he's gone ..." Peter shook his head.

"Your life was valuable to _him_!"

"Yeah. And he's dead." Peter shot back. There was way too much emotion in what Sylar had said. "Why do you care?" He assumed this was just some leftover emotions from Nathan. He wasn't sure if it was disgusting or heart-warming that that might be why Sylar hadn't killed him where he stood when he entered Matt Parkman's house.

Sylar grabbed him by the collar and shoved him bodily against the brick wall of the building they were walking alongside. "Peter, don't doubt your faith. You save lives. You just, tonight, saved _thousands!_ Every fucking day you make a difference to people. I've seen you. I know what you do. You _help_. I think you're the connection. You're the one I was being led to."

"Fuck you, Sylar!" His life and his feelings weren't any of Sylar's concern. If Sylar cared so much about them, then why had he killed Nathan? Or Matt? Or any of them? The man laid waste to everything he touched – just like Peter did. He batted Sylar's hand away and twisted free, only to get grabbed again and slammed back – this time with enough force that he was sure Sylar was augmenting with telekinesis. _That's not fair!_

"Peter, if your life is so worthless when you do so much for people, then what does that make mine?"

Peter blinked. _Well, that was kind of why … I mean …_ He swallowed. It wasn't right to kill someone, even Sylar. _I was trying to save Nathan_, he thought stubbornly, about his attempted murder of Sylar at Mercy. He squirmed, but it wasn't an organized attempt to free himself. _So we're both fucked._ "Fine. Come back to my apartment, then. It doesn't matter what you might do to me." He shoved Sylar off, turning and stalking down the street. Sylar followed.

Peter's apartment wasn't exactly flush with beds. He had one. No couch. No futon. No foam pad. Just one double bed. Various raids by the government and unexpected periods of absence (including concomitant failure to pay rent) had resulted in him losing nearly everything he owned a couple times over. All he had left was what they couldn't take. He'd replaced the bare necessities and that hadn't included optional sleeping arrangements for possible guests. He ignored Sylar, who padded around the apartment restlessly like a tiger unhappy about the limits of his cage. Peter stripped off his clothes and put on pajama bottoms, climbing into bed after a very long day that had been preceded by more nights of broken sleep than he cared to think about. He was still angry. He was still grieving his brother. He was worried sick about the future. He was trying not to give a damn about the deranged serial killer who had decided to take up residence in the only place Peter could call home, even if it wasn't much of one. Against it all, he clamped his eyes shut and tried to sleep.

After a while, he heard the rustle of clothing in the room. He felt the dip of the mattress. He didn't know what was about to happen and he didn't care – or rather, he did and he did, but he was trying to bury both as deep as possible in his subconscious. He didn't know if he wanted what was about to happen, but it was going to happen and he wasn't going to stop it. In a weird way, it was a culmination of all the fights and struggles they'd had. It was the resolution and climax the night needed. He felt Sylar's fingers brush lightly along his bare ribs and Peter shuddered in anticipation. He was so tired, though.

"Take regeneration," Sylar whispered, leaning forward to trail soft, wet kisses along his spine. Peter's back arched in pleasure. He reached for the ability, feeling blind in the doing because he wasn't using his hand to channel it as he always had before. But the ability came to him anyway, transferring through Sylar's lips against his skin. The regeneration didn't do anything about his emotions, but it cleared away much of his exhaustion and the fact that he hadn't eaten since the day before. "Let me take care of you," Sylar murmured into his hair, having moved up his back to his head. One hand was still stroking Peter's side, roaming up almost to the level of his nipple, then downward to the waistband of his pajama bottoms. The other hand, Sylar shifted his weight and brought it into play with Peter's hair. Peter sighed out a whimper as Sylar's teeth nibbled at his neck.

_Fuck this tentative stuff. You're going to do it anyway._ Peter pulled down his pants, kicking them off. Then he reached over the side of the bed, grasping around in the darkness. He found the bottle of hand lotion and passed it back without explanation. He heard the bottle exhale noisily, spuming its contents into Sylar's palm. Peter raised the knee and lifted his uppermost leg. Oh yes, telepathy was incredibly convenient, but Sylar would have figured it out anyway. Cold creaminess was smoothed across his crack, slick, lotioned fingers probing and exploring.

_Faster!_ Peter thought. He didn't want to start thinking about what he was doing, what he was allowing. If he thought about it, he might have to try to stop it. Sylar rumbled something displeased, but moved into place anyway to spoon behind Peter, his endowments, whatever they might be, generous enough to allow the position. It took a little jockeying and Peter wasn't entirely ready for the rough penetration, but he welcomed the discomfort. He didn't want it to be perfect. He wanted it messy and painful like all the rest of their interactions. With that thought, Sylar changed from the slow nudges to give him a hard thrust.

"Yeah!" Peter barked out, immediately ashamed that he'd made an actual verbalization of assent.

Sylar twisted his lowermost arm to reach under Peter's neck, wrapping it around his throat. "If that's how you feel, then I won't let you speak again." A moment later, quite unrelated to the hand across him, he felt his throat seize just like it had at Kirby Plaza. Peter's hands, which to this point had been largely unoccupied, flew to the one at his throat, clinging to it. He couldn't breathe. Sylar's thrusts were coming fast and hard now, his other hand holding Peter's hip to give him leverage. "Jerk yourself off, Peter," he directed. Peter made a strangled, choking noise. Sylar let him breathe for one, two, three gasps before cutting the air off again. "Jerk yourself off or I won't let you breathe."

One of Peter's hands left his throat, taking himself in his grip and tugging with quick, short motions. The pressure on his windpipe eased, but Sylar's hand over his throat tightened, fingers digging in as he rode Peter even harder. This wasn't going to take long for either of them. Peter could feel his peak rising fast, his head fuzzing out on the limited oxygen he was getting. He shuddered again, feeling the whole world contract and all his worries and cares fall away. There was nothing left but the physical – the cock ramming into him, his hand shaking up and down on his dick, Sylar's hands claiming him possessively. It all came together at once. He felt Sylar shove into him harder and then the man's hips stuttered. Sylar's gasping breaths were loud in Peter's ears. He thought he could feel the throbbing of Sylar's cock as it emptied itself inside of him. That thought – Sylar had fucked him to completion, had come inside him – drove him over the edge. He came, spurting.

The hand at his throat loosened. Peter felt Sylar's forehead come forward to rest against his shoulder. Peter sagged, the euphoria making him boneless and happy. Nothing else mattered right now. Not even Sylar fucking him in the ass, which was something he was pretty sure he would pay for later somehow. If no one else flogged him for it, he'd do the honor himself. Sylar withdrew from him wet and limp, reaching down between them to rub between Peter's legs, fingers caressing asshole and taint and balls as if to rub in the remaining lotion. Or maybe just to say, 'This is mine.'

Peter smiled faintly as the touching sent aftershocks crashing through him. Okay, maybe he wouldn't flog himself too badly. Not as long as Sylar never mentioned it. A small kiss on his shoulder was his answer before Sylar pulled away, turning to face the other direction. Sleep, deep, restful, and unbroken, pulled him under.

Sylar took him again in the morning, before it was even light outside. This time, Peter didn't think he'd done anything to ask for it, even mentally, but it wasn't like Sylar didn't have his own will in the matter. With his abilities, he could take whatever he wanted. That's not to say Peter was or wasn't consenting. He positioned himself, took it, and sighed as Sylar padded off to the shower afterward. Peter finished himself alone in the bed, then waited for Sylar to exit the shower before taking his own turn.

He was pulling on his pants after finishing in the bathroom, chest and feet still bare, when he realized Sylar was in the process of leaving. With a yelp, Peter hurried into the living room. "No! Hey!"

Sylar hesitated, the dark blue front door open as he gave Peter a wary, questioning look. Peter grabbed him at the elbow of his black woolen jacket, taking a power fast and at random.

"No, wait," Peter muttered as he realized which one he'd gained, "Maybe flight's not a good choice. What else do you have?" He reached for Sylar's arm again, but Sylar dodged back with a grimace. The door swung mostly closed. "Come here," Peter said irritably, grabbing at him and for a moment the two flailed at one another – Peter trying to get a hold and Sylar trying not to be held, and interestingly to Peter's mind, not fighting back. Then Peter's hand made contact for a moment – maybe it was long enough, he felt a tingle – and Sylar used telekinesis to throw him back against the door. Peter's weight against it caused it to slam shut the last few inches it had to travel, and rattled him against it. He'd bitten the end of his tongue and hit the back of his head, but neither were all that critical or intentional. His senses felt … heightened … and all the input was stunning.

It took him a few seconds to orient on Sylar, who was busy lecturing him about personal conduct, which was rich. Sylar was telling him indignantly, "You do not get to rifle through my abilities like I'm your own personal card catalogue, Petrelli! I worked hard for those abilities. I risked my life for them – murdered people! I _bled_ and _died_ for some of them! You don't get to take them at will like you're checking a book out of the library!"

Peter lifted his head. Things were different inside his brain now. He could feel that as the fuzziness receded. He focused his new power. He'd had this one before and the potential for abuse with it was something he'd spent a lot of time thinking about. "You can't tell me what to do."

Sylar looked confused and then surprised as he tried to speak ... and failed.

"Let me go."

Peter was lowered a second later as Sylar continued to struggle with himself. All Sylar managed to get out was, "Stop-" before his own vocal cords rebelled against him and closed up, refusing to allow him to finish with whatever he was going to say. Peter grinned. He knew he shouldn't. He knew this wasn't the time for it, but the expression of horror and alarm on Sylar's face was just fucking priceless. He couldn't hear the jangled, angry thoughts swarming inside Sylar's head, but he could imagine them. Sylar thought he was so invincible with all his powers, but Peter had bested him repeatedly despite it.

Perhaps this was a bad time to stand around gloating. Sylar seemed to have realized something; his head snapped up and he glared daggers at Peter. "Don't-" was all Peter got out before a telekinetic blast sent him hurdling out of his living room and into the bedroom, skidding on the floor to catch up against the far wall. By the time Peter got to his feet, Sylar had left.


	2. Splinters

The sprinklers had run their course. Amanda was wet and miserable, shivering under the dry blanket the police woman, or detective, or government agent, or whatever had brought her. The woman was blonde and young-looking on first glance, but Amanda had noticed Audrey Hanson had lines around her eyes and a way of holding herself that wasn't 'young' at all. "None of it was my fault," Amanda said defensively from under her blanket. Maybe if she said it often enough, they'd believe her and let her go.

"You're going to have to explain it to me – all of it," Audrey told her. "That's the only way this can work. I've already spoken with several others who were there, so I know a lot of it."

"None of us would talk with you! You're one of _them!_"

Audrey tilted her head slightly. "Mrs. Comey talked with me. About you, in fact. She's concerned about you, and about Jennie, too. With her immunity to heat, she was able to pull two police officers out of the fires you started, saving their lives. She's a hero – and _she _doesn't see a distinction between 'them' and 'us'."

Amanda scowled, but she couldn't keep up the angry act. In the face of the implied disapproval of Mrs. Comey, she sighed and let her shoulders slump. Mrs. Comey was one of the nicest and mildest of the carnies. Every morning, she cooked such delicious blueberry pancakes for everyone. If she had thought it was okay to talk to the police, then … then maybe it was. And Audrey was right about how the breakfast lady had tried to stop the fighting.

"It all started when those frat boys stole some of the teddy bear prizes. That was after the hero guy teleported us back."

"What did they look like?"

"They were pink and purple and about three feet tall," Amanda said. "They were the big ones."

Audrey blinked a couple times. "No, I meant the frat boys, not the … bears."

Amanda gave her a confused look, like she was crazy for asking. "I don't know! They were frat boys!" She rolled her eyes at how unimportant they were. Getting the bears back mattered a lot more. "Besides, I didn't see them."

"Oh." She looked disappointed.

"But I know what happened," Amanda jumped in, not wanting to seem out of the loop. "Ian and Keith went over to the police to get them to do something about the stolen bears, but the cops were all busy asking what we were doing having a carnival in the middle of Central Park, like we didn't have a right to be there," she said indignantly. "It's a public place, right?" Audrey gave her a half-hearted nod, like she wanted to disagree, but couldn't quite do it. "So Ian and Keith were trying to get the cops to get the bears back – they could see still see the frat guys walking off with them, flipping them off and being rude, but the police _wouldn't_. They wouldn't do _anything!_"

Amanda hadn't been there herself, but she was reporting what she'd been told, hurriedly by Ian, and doing a little extrapolating of her own. "When Ian and Keith said 'then fine, we'll just go get the bears ourselves,' the cops told them that would be stealing, and how did they know the frat guys hadn't won those bears as prizes? _Hello?_" she said in exasperation at the stupidity of some people. "We'd been gone for _over an hour_! No one was there running the games while that Japanese guy had his bloody nose and whatever. They _stole_ those bears and the cops knew it, but when it came down to taking _our_ side or _theirs,_ they took _theirs_, because you cops don't care about us at all!"

Audrey exhaled heavily and gave an ambivalent shrug that Amanda interpreted as an admission of defeat.

"Yeah," Amanda said harshly. "So when Keith said he didn't care what the cops were going to do, or something … I'm not sure what exactly happened, but the cops pushed him down and put handcuffs on him and were yelling at Ian and going to do the same thing to him, but he ran off and got me and some of the rest of us. When we came back, they'd put Keith in a cop car and when we told them they had to let him go, he hadn't done anything wrong, they basically told us to stick it – they were cops, they could do what they wanted, and we needed to get the carnival out of Central Park before they had trucks show up and impound everything." Amanda grimaced and pursed her lips, brows pulling together. In a shaky voice, she said, "But without Samuel, we _couldn't_ get it out of there. I mean, we just couldn't. There … there aren't enough trucks. We don't have trucks- that's not how we moved the carnival around. We, we always used his power. But without him … so we were stuck. And I … I got mad. I told them they _had_ to let Keith go and they _couldn't_ take away our home, and then when they just laughed at me, I set one of their cars on fire to show them I wasn't messing around."

"And that's how it started." It wasn't really a question.

Amanda nodded. "Except _they_ started it by not going after the people who stole the bears!" She glared at Audrey until the other woman nodded in agreement. Only then did Amanda continue the tale. "After I set the police car on fire, the cops pulled guns and everyone started yelling and they started shooting and John caught the bullets but I didn't see that at first – the bullets, I just thought they'd missed me - so I set _another_ car on fire that had people in it who had just pulled up. I thought they'd get out or leave or something, but for some reason they didn't. Maybe, like, they couldn't, because I could see them trying to open the doors but they wouldn't open."

"Ah," Audrey said softly. "Do you think John, who caught the bullets, might have also jammed the doors?"

"Why would he do that?"

Audrey shrugged. "Maybe he didn't understand that you weren't trying to kill them. Maybe he thought, when you threw a ball of fire at an occupied car and engulfed it, that you were trying to hurt or kill the people inside." She added understandingly, "You were just trying to scare them, right?"

"Well … yeah, I guess. I wasn't thinking. There was just … so much going on. Then Mrs. Comey went over and pulled them out, and the other cops had shot someone – I didn't see who – and Teddy showed up with a gun from somewhere and the cops ran off, the cowards."

Audrey frowned at Amanda's slander of the rational response of the police. "But that wasn't the end of it." Again, it wasn't a question.

"No. We were, um ..." Amanda shrugged. They'd been excited, elated at their 'victory', and still angry about the police misbehavior, the theft of the bears, and the threat to impound and/or destroy their homes. At least they'd been able to get Keith out of the cop car he'd been abandoned in. "We thought, maybe, if they saw they couldn't push us around, that they'd leave us alone. Samuel had said this would be the night when we showed everyone what we could do, after all, so maybe he'd seen this? Different groups had different ideas and without anyone there who was in charge, we sort of all went off to do our own thing. So we burned some stuff, some buildings and cars, whatever we found in the street. We thought maybe all the cops and firemen would be busy dealing with that and we could just cloak the carnival again and stay that way until we figured out what to do." She frowned at how mistaken they had been. "It didn't work out."

Audrey nodded at the understatement.

"There are a lot more police out there than I knew," Amanda said. She knew New York City had a big police force, but it hadn't prepared her for how cops and agents and SWAT teams and fire trucks and all sorts of emergency responders had come swarming out of nowhere less than half an hour from the initial fracas. Once she and the Bowman family, who were the other firestarters of the carnival, had been doused with a fire hose, things had gone really badly for them. It was how she had ended up here in an interrogation room. And the Bowmans – Gail had been shot, maybe killed and she was pretty sure the police had Chris, too. She didn't even know what had happened to Jennie, a few years younger than herself – they'd been separated during one of the waves of tear gas. It sounded like Mrs. Comey didn't know what had happened to her either. Jennie had been her best friend. Now neither one of them had a family.

"The carnival is over, isn't it?" Amanda asked sadly with a hiccup in her voice. Another home, another family, lost because she couldn't control her ability. It was all her fault after all.

Audrey nodded slowly. "I'm sorry."

XXX

"You have no right to hold me. I haven't done anything wrong." Claire threw back her head in defiance after Audrey made her introductions and offered her a coffee Claire wasn't about to drink.

Audrey sat down opposite her at the table. "Of course not. That's why you're here."

Claire looked dubious, as that wasn't her understanding of how the legal process worked. "If you already know, then why are you questioning me?"

"I didn't say I already knew anything. What do you think I need to know?"

"That there are people with abilities out there."

Audrey nodded. "Yep. I knew that."

"You did?"

"Yes. Maybe not as long as you have or as personally, but for the last four years, I've been living and breathing stuff about these 'abilities'. I spend all my time chasing down criminal cases involving them. That's my job."

Claire wondered if Audrey didn't remember interviewing her in Texas all those years ago. Maybe she didn't, or had lost her memory of it. Claire didn't know and so decided to pretend it hadn't happened. "Having an ability doesn't make a person a criminal."

"Of course not. But committing crimes does. And sometimes, people with abilities do that. Just like people who _don't _have abilities."

Claire's brows drew down in a suspicious scowl. That was true. Sylar and Samuel came to mind – there were definitely villains among those gifted with powers. "So … you're like the Company? What happened to the Homeland Security thing?"

"The 'Homeland Security thing' didn't pan out. We're trying to be more selective these days, which is why I need all the information you can give me."

"'These days'? You had me on round-the-clock surveillance just a few months ago. I don't have to give you any information. You probably know more than I do!"

"Maybe." Audrey shrugged like it didn't matter, which Claire found irritating. "I recognize that you're a US citizen and you have rights. But I'll let you know, there are a lot of other people I've been talking to tonight, and a bunch of them are _not_ happy with you."

"_Me?_" Claire was outraged. "What did I do?"

"Your name keeps coming up. They tell me you conspired with your father to infiltrate them and then sell them out so the Company could abduct Samuel Sullivan and allow the government to swoop in and dismantle the carnival for good."

"That's ..." Claire huffed in disbelief. "No!" She jangled at the chains that cuffed her hands to the heavy, fire-scorched table. "That's not it at all!" None of that was supposed to happen. But she'd overheard the media between interviews earlier this night. Apparently there'd been a riot or something after she'd left. What had happened while she was closeted with the reporters for all those hours, showing them her ability and talking about the government's secret programs? And where was Noah during all of this? Was he okay? After her jump off the Ferris Wheel, the reporters had quickly talked her into walking the few blocks to an insulated local sound stage where they began to take turns getting their own private air time with her, the others spending the time in between calling up experts on biology and medicine and coming back with better questions, some of which had puzzled even her. It had been very distracting, ended only by whatever agency Audrey Hanson worked for showing up and virtually arresting her – which was how she'd gotten here, in an interrogation room which had, from the looks of it, already seen a lot of odd traffic tonight.

"Well," Audrey shrugged, "That's what they tell me." Audrey shrugged again, this time with only one shoulder, sort of ambivalently. Claire was getting really tired of her shrugging. It reminded her of Jackie Wilcox, all those years ago. "Their story hangs together. It kind of looks like it might be true."

"It isn't!" Claire hissed, alarmed by the accusation and provoked by what she was thinking had to be a deliberately annoying affectation on Audrey's part.

"Okay." Audrey looked at her expectantly.

Claire sighed heavily and leaned back. It was obvious that Audrey expected her to spill the beans and tell her side of the story. She knew she was being played, but she had to say _something_. "I was invited to the carnival. I went several times. I was welcomed each time. They wanted me to join. I told them I'd consider it. So it wasn't like I was 'infiltrating' them. _They_ sought _me_ out."

"Were you invited last night?"

It still felt like 'tonight' to Claire, but given that it was somewhere past four in the morning, she assumed 'last night' was correct. "Yes."

After a long pause, Audrey said, "So, about the part where you conspired to make Samuel powerless so the Company could abduct him …?"

"That's … not … really true. I mean, it sort of is, but you make it sound awful. It's not! Samuel was going to do something really bad, like open up another of those sinkholes or tear down buildings. Right here in New York!"

Audrey nodded. "Big earthquake. Yeah, that's a big deal in a major city like this. 9/11 only took down a few buildings. A big enough earthquake right here could take down the whole island. We're lucky it didn't do more damage than it did, but people still died – at least two on the docks, and I wouldn't be surprised if we hear of more as news trickles in."

Claire nodded in return and was silent. She was afraid of getting herself in deep trouble here, but she couldn't see where the line was between safe and unsafe information to share. She wished she could just leave, but she was chained to the table and wasn't sure if anyone who cared about her even knew where she was. It wasn't like the government had told the press where they were taking her. Last she'd seen her father was at the carnival, escorting Doyle away.

"So that's your side of it," Audrey said. "But the people I've talked to felt betrayed – by you in particular."

"They shouldn't!" Claire burst out. "I saved them!"

"What about taking them away from the carnival? Suddenly everyone could see it. Police were called. It was a mess. They lost their homes!"

"What?"

Audrey looked innocent and shrugged.

Claire ground her teeth. "They lost their homes? What do you mean?"

"What did you think was going to happen if you took everyone away from the carnival all at once? They couldn't hide it anymore."

Claire blinked, thinking about that. "But … they came back, right? Hiro brought them back … right?"

"Eventually." Audrey shrugged and stood up. "I guess you were off with the reporters during all of that. I was just hoping you could shed a little more light on it."

Claire didn't know what to say. She was still reeling from the idea that she'd ruined the lives of everyone in the carnival. Had she?

Audrey stopped at the door. "You know, it's funny. Four years ago, one of my first cases was this serial killer named Sylar. You and I met in Odessa, Texas, remember?" Claire nodded, realizing Audrey _had_ known they'd met before and her ignorance was an act designed to extract more information from her. "You said you didn't know him then." Audrey chewed her lip slowly. "But you were there a couple months ago when he tried to kill the president at the Stanton Hotel. You were standing right beside him when he signed in as Nathan Petrelli. Apparently, he's been at the carnival a lot since then." Claire's eyes widened as she met the icy blue ones of Agent Hanson. "Which is pretty much the same time frame that you've been going there, too." She opened the door. "Until I get to the bottom of this, you aren't going anywhere."


	3. Broken World

Peter finished dressing. In the course of fishing his phone out from where the fighting had knocked it under the bed, he remembered someone had called earlier. Sylar had been about three bold strokes into him when the phone had begun to buzz and vibrate madly, like someone out there was psychic about their timing. Sylar had growled, "I had better be the most important person in your life at the moment, Peter," and kept pumping into him. Peter had been face down, ass-up, with Sylar crouched behind him and really starting to pound. Answering the phone had not been a serious consideration, not even for a heartbeat. He'd thought something that was inarticulate even for a thought about answering machines and otherwise went back to enjoying the moment and the honesty of Sylar's raw desire for him (or at least his body), promptly forgetting the interruption until now.

So who'd called? Oh yes. It _was_ a psychic: his mother. He hesitated on the option of calling her back. _What if she dreamed what I was doing? Or who, I guess. Um … Fuck. _How would he ever look her in the face again? He hit the button anyway. Her voice was normal enough upon answering, "Hello?" That gave him hope.

"Hi. Um, Mom?"

Then her voice was no longer normal at all as she realized who had called. "Peter." It was one word, but it conveyed everything. She knew.

He cleared his throat. He felt an inch tall, utterly worthless, like he'd soiled himself in some intentional and irreparable way. And what could he say, anyway? 'Yeah, Ma, I spent the night being repeatedly fucked by Nathan's murderer because I'm too damaged anymore to do the right thing.' Whatever that 'right thing' was in this situation. He felt defective. He'd disappointed her, and he was the only son she had left. He cleared his throat again, fighting against the sudden tightness in it. "You … called?"

"And I left a message," she said so sharply you could cut a falling sheet of paper with her words. "You should listen to it." She hung up.

He shuddered and clicked the phone off. _It wasn't my idea! None of it was! I didn't know this would happen!_ It was the story of his life. And now, he didn't even have Sylar, or know where he was, although 'having' Sylar was a dubious reward by itself. He had enjoyed Sylar having him, though. Having someone want him so viscerally, in such a complicated yet uncomplicated fashion, was everything Peter wanted. There was no way he could say no to that, just like there was no possible way to explain that to his mother – or to anyone, really. Alone, he sank down on the bed, pressing the slick, black plastic of the phone against his forehead until he couldn't continue to delay listening. He dialed his voicemail.

It was a simple message, less cryptic than his mother's messages often were: "Sylar will ruin everything our family has ever worked for. You must stop him." He listened to it twice more, writing it down on a slip of paper and staring at it, the fingers of his left hand curled against his lip, elbow propped on his knee as he sat on the edge of his bed. _'Everything our family has ever worked for' – like blood money, persecution, underhanded bullshit? 'You must stop him' – really? What happens if I don't? Doesn't sound like he's going to ruin anything I care about. Or is she saying he's going to ruin everything and __**then**__ I'm supposed to stop him?_

His phone buzzed again. With narrowed eyes, he checked who was calling, but then sighed. His mother's premonitions were often world-changing in nature, but his work was calling him in for an extra shift anyway. What was more important: saving the world, or covering for someone who was out sick? The difference was comical, but he answered the phone. These were people who actually needed him.

A half hour later, he was walking into work, very glad he'd taken the call. There had been some kind of disaster overnight that he'd managed to sleep through. He wanted the details, but his supervisor hadn't given him any over the phone. Peter thought it unlikely anyone else would know about the carnival unless they understood specials, which was why his first stop was by Emma's desk. She was there, looking tired and wrung out, bandages on her fingers.

"Emma? What are you doing here?" he asked. Even though he'd come looking for her, he hadn't expected to find her. "Your fingers?"

"I can still work," she said stubbornly, watching his face with a frown of concentration. He could hear her thoughts behind the words: _I couldn't sleep anyway after all of that._

Peter slipped around her desk and offered a wordless hug. She stood and returned it. The events of the night played through her mind and as he'd gathered, they didn't stop when she'd gotten in the taxi and left. She'd been woken by police a little after 3 am, and brought in for a questioning session that had frightened her as much as what Samuel and Doyle had done to her. Gripped by fear, she'd returned home to comb through the non-existent news reports and finally came here to work, where she'd learned there had been a riot at the carnival site after she'd left, and a confrontation between carnies and police that had cascaded into cop cars and buildings set aflame. Peter's mouth opened slightly in horror at what she was thinking. All of this had happened while he was at his apartment? He knew it wasn't his fault, but what if he'd stayed? Could he have stopped it? Could he and Sylar, together, have stopped it?

He broke the hug, holding her at arm's length so she could see his lips. "Emma, I-" He paused, interrupted by hearing Nurse Hammer loudly saying his name down the hall, confirming that yes, a Peter Petrelli did work here but she didn't know where he was. There was something about her tone that he registered as a warning. And besides, she knew exactly where he was, because he'd asked her if Emma was in today before walking down here. "Wait," he told Emma, letting her go and going to the corner of her work area, looking out. There were two beefy-looking police officers next to the squat form of Nurse Hammer. One of them glanced down the hall at him, expression sharpening in recognition. _Shit._ Despite the many possible inoffensive reasons police officers might have to be looking for him, the experience of being on the run from Homeland Security had left deep marks. He turned to Emma. "I have to go."

Peter wasted no time in running, using every twist and turn of the hospital layout to his advantage. He panted at the end of a long hallway, listening. He heard nothing out of place – no running footfalls, no shouts, no alarms, no coded announcements. It was so much 'business as usual' that he assumed they hadn't bothered to give chase. _What if Emma ran interference for me and got in trouble? _Worry creasing his brow, he circled back to check the most likely area where they'd parked. If it was just the two of them, then he could use the telepathy he'd taken from Sylar to make them let her go.

He saw the police car. It was just the one vehicle. A quick scan of the street showed no SWAT vans or other suspicious trucks lurking about. Ramming his hands into the pockets of his paramedic jacket against the cold, he walked down the sidewalk towards the car, feeling very exposed. He was almost to it when the two officers came out of the building nearby, talking to each other. Peter stopped, squaring off between them and their car, hands still in his pockets. They saw him as one and fell silent, but they didn't stop and they didn't have Emma with them. It was odd and not the arrest he'd been expecting. He tilted his head as they approached him, listening to their thoughts.

_What's he got in his pockets? I don't like this._

_Get in a fighting stance. Spaulding can go left. I'll take right. This might be bad. Maybe we should stop here. What if he's a firestarter like those others?_

Peter pulled his hands out slowly, letting his empty palms show. "I didn't come here to fight."

_Okay. Good. Great._ "Are you Peter Petrelli?" Both cops stopped a little further away from him than conversational distance. They eyed him suspiciously, but neither was doing anything else. Peter noted there were no guns drawn, no calls for backup. Peter nodded in answer to the question. The one who had spoken, 'Spaulding', nodded in return and faked a friendly smile. "We're here to bring you in for questioning."

"Am I being detained?"

The two men looked at each other. One thought, '_Crap. He's going to lawyer up._' The other was more nonchalant, caring less whether they brought him in or not and more that he did what he'd been told to do, '_Hanson will be pissed, but she's the one who told us to handle him with kid gloves because he's on that special list of the president's._' They looked back at Peter. "We have some questions we need to ask you."

Peter noticed the lack of an affirmative answer, which translated to 'no, you're not being detained.' "Ask them."

"At the pre-" _Well, not really at the precinct. He won't know, though._ "At the precinct." _The Special Investigations HQ._

Peter nodded slowly. "I'm not going." He turned and started to walk off, his mental attention still on them to see what would happen next. From their thoughts, he anticipated what did happen – nothing. They walked forward to their car and spoke quietly with one another, but the consensus was they were done here. Audrey Hanson had sent them to bring him in, but had very specifically stopped short of authorizing arrest or coercion. Plus, she'd warned them that he might have an ability and not to push him.

That was it – anticlimactic, but very informative for Peter. _Audrey Hanson_, he repeated to himself. _Where do I know that name from?_ The memory surfaced slowly, with difficulty, of a hard-nosed, sharp-voiced woman sitting off to the side of a bare concrete interrogation room in Odessa, Texas; a cup of bitter, overcooked coffee in front of him; and the jarring mental dissonance of Matt Parkman trying to read his mind. He'd felt so sick from the ability absorption and was reeling from the experience of dying and coming back to life, but he still remembered her. A good memory for names and faces – Peter had that.

Recalling where he knew her from brought another name and face to mind. Once out of sight of the police, he pulled out his phone and dialed Claire. His concern turned to apprehension when she didn't answer. With a heavy lurch in his gut, he remembered his feeling from the night before that she'd need saving, and soon. He gritted his teeth in anger – at himself and at her. _I knew. I knew it and I still walked away!_ Impotent rage passed through him and he wanted to punch something, but the brick wall at his back might distract him from his wrath via broken knuckles, but it wouldn't help. He kicked it instead. _I am such an idiot!_

_This isn't helping. _He stopped throwing a tantrum and scrolled through his contacts, dialing Noah next.

"Hello. Peter?" Noah's voice was clipped.

"Hey. Do you know where Claire is?"

"The government's taken her. Where are you?"

"I'm at work. A pair of policemen just tried to bring me in. I told them no and they actually took that for an answer."

There was a moment of silence. "That's … interesting. The earthquake set off more than just seismic shockwaves, Peter. There are a lot of government people who were mobilized last night. I gather they think someone tried to bring down New York City, which isn't too far off target. I've been trying to get time with some of them to find out where Claire is, who's in charge, and what their agenda is. Do you have any leads?"

"Just one: Audrey Hanson." He waited a beat, but Noah didn't speak, so Peter explained, "She's the one who interviewed me in Odessa, after the stadium, after Sylar showed up."

"I remember," Noah said.

"Why do I have the feeling you're not telling me everything you remember?"

Peter could hear Noah's wry smile. "If I told you everything, it would take too long. But the short version is she tried to investigate the Company back then. It didn't go anywhere. I heard about her when I was working with Danko, but she was still with the FBI - not part of Homeland Security. I don't know why, but it wasn't part of her career path. Of course, investigating specials has never been good for anyone's career, until now."

"If I have to find her to find Claire, then that's what I'm going to do."

"Okay, Peter. I'll call you if I find anything."

"Sure." He hung up. Peter stared at his phone for a moment, thinking about what he should do next. The cops had mentioned, or at least thought about, a headquarters, but he had received only the fuzziest impression from them of where it was. He knew where the carnival had been the night before, though, so he ducked inside to tell his supervisor he was taking the day off (and after his vociferous objections, got it approved with the convenient whammy of pushing a thought), then grabbed a taxi and headed to Central Park. The cabbie dropped him off on the edge of the park. He could see police lines blocking off the section where the carnival equipment, tents, and trailers had been the night before. Now there were only a few trailers. As he walked closer, he could see tow trucks and flatbeds setting up to take away the last of the structures.

He stopped next to the police line and spoke to the officer who had walked over at his approach. "Where are they taking all those trailers?"

"Impound."

"Why? Where are the owners?"

"No permit."

"What?" Peter asked.

"You can't just set up a carnival in the middle of New York without a permit."

Peter frowned. "Where are the owners?"

"You mean the owners of the carnival?"

"Yes."

The cop shrugged. "I dunno." She was being truthful, Peter could tell, and more helpful than was strictly required. Which probably had a lot to do with the paramedic uniform Peter was wearing. "Were you here last night?"

"No, no. One of my friends was, though. She told me about it. Did people get hurt?"

The cop nodded. "It was pretty bad."

Peter's eyes widened as the woman's thoughts informed him there had been multiple deaths among the police and several severe injuries. "How many died?"

She shook her head. "It was really bad." _Six or seven?_ ran through her mind, but she didn't know specifics. Everyone who had been on the night shift had been rotated off, many with injuries ranging from severe burns and smoke inhalation to bruises and sprains. Besides, more government agents and officers from the precincts within driving distance had been pouring in all morning. She suspected they had more people than they knew what to do with, but the mobile HQ kept gathering people up and sending them out in teams with the mission of bringing back the scattered carnies – teams that she hadn't been part of, much to her irritation.

"I need to report in to HQ," Peter told her. "Where is that?"

She looked him up and down for a moment, dubious because she hadn't seen any other EMTs called in. But she supposed it made sense. He was a first responder, and she could tell from his insignia that he was local. She hooked her head at what looked like a collection of cargo containers that had been dumped off on the street on the other side of the park. "Over there. The blue one is where you check in."

"Got it," he said, stepping over the yellow tape, being careful not to catch his toe on it and either rip the tape or take a dive, either of which would be embarrassing.

There was a small mob of people on the other side of the collection of cargo containers. The blue one had signs taped to the outside of it identifying it as the coordination center. Peter waited a moment, watching the ebb and flow of the crowd, scanning people's thoughts to find out who they were and what they were doing there. The group included truck drivers, police officers, a representative from the mayor's office, several firefighters, a bunch of building inspectors in normal street clothes, and a bunch of government agents in business casual. He noticed there were no guards and no one in SWAT gear. This was an administrative center. He wasn't going to find Claire or any other special here. He didn't think that was quite where he wanted to be.

He followed the woman from the mayor's office as she went to a less trafficked green container. The sign on it simply said, 'Central'. She didn't pay him any mind as he went in, nor to the tall police woman who came in behind him. The mayor's rep tied up the receptionist with questions about scheduling for a report by the local news stations. Peter went towards the opposite end of the container, leaving the police woman waiting for her turn as additional distraction for the beleaguered receptionist.

The door to the office that took up the left end of the cargo container was open. Inside, he could see a blonde woman frowning at her computer screen and occasionally hammering at the keys. He recognized Ms. Hanson and slipped inside, pushing the door shut behind him. That got her attention, but for a second, she looked at him without recognition.

Audrey straightened, then modified her startled stiffness by continuing the movement to lean back in her chair, arms flopping down on the arm rests. "Peter Petrelli." Her eyes went past him to the door. "Where are the officers who were supposed to pick you up?"

He shrugged. "Probably stuck in traffic somewhere." She raised her brows inquiringly. "I didn't do anything to them," he said defensively.

"I heard you told them to get lost," she said in accusation, like he really had done something wrong.

Peter stared at her for a second before getting enough of her thoughts to laugh. She was making a joke. Under the layers of genuine concern and fear and bluff, she was making a joke. He wasn't sure he saw the humor, but she thought it was funny that of all the things an unpredictable, loose cannon special like himself _could _have done to her men, he'd told them to screw off and then he'd shown up here anyway. She hoped he wasn't here to kill her – she had memos she wasn't done with and she didn't want to die with a headache.

To allay her fears and get to the heart of the matter, he said, "I'm here to find Claire Bennet. Are you holding her?"

Audrey lifted her hands and made a wordless show of how empty they were.

Peter pursed his lips and cocked his head. "_Answer my questions_," he said, pushing the thought. "I don't have time to play games."

"You won't find Claire Bennet here." Audrey's expression hardened as she recognized and struggled with the compulsion to say more.

"Where is she?"

"In ..." Audrey stopped leaning, sitting up. She was thinking about the gun she wore. She was thinking about yelling for help. She was thinking she needed to have a panic button installed in her office, which wasn't a place where she'd ever expected to be confronted like this. "Washington … DC." She panted from the strain of trying to resist and glared at him angrily.

"What is she doing there?"

_Nothing. Hanging out. Site-seeing_. Flippant responses passed through Audrey's mind, but she was too by the book to acknowledge them as legitimate answers to Peter's question. "She's being held for further interrogation."

"Where?"

"Building 26."

Peter grimaced. But of course the place hadn't gone away just because he wanted it to. The government still owned it, still operated it, and still had a vested interest in figuring out specials. "How many other specials have been taken there?"

"I-" She grunted. With great difficulty, her head throbbing in worse pain than it had been before he'd come in, she ground out, "You know, asshole, there is the possibility of having a decent conversation here, but you're blowing it!"

Peter exhaled softly and stopped concentrating on forcing her cooperation.

Audrey groaned and put her head in her hands, elbows on knees. Peter glanced behind him. The voices through the thin door had faded to quiet, but at least no one had tried to bother him. Yet. He turned back to her. "I don't have much time."

"What are you trying to accomplish? Are you just going to jail-break her?"

Peter frowned. "You can't hold her forever."

"We haven't even held her twenty-four hours! Maybe not even twelve. Legally, we can hold her a little longer, Mr. Rescue Ranger. She's not in danger."

"What are you going to do her?"

Audrey sat up, brows rising. "Ask her questions. Maybe she can explain all of this." She waved her hand in a way that indicated her computer, office, the cargo container, or maybe all of New York. She meant the entire situation.

"So what if she can? It's not your business."

"The hell it's not!" Audrey said hotly. "A bunch of yahoos almost shook New York City to its foundations! That's not my business? Not the government's business? Are we supposed to sit around and hope _you people_," she waved at Peter, her thoughts indicating specials as a whole, "can work it out on your own, when you can't even handle a few shoplifters without inciting a riot?"

"Okay … that ..." He wasn't sure what to say. It was painfully true and apparent to him that specials, especially the carnival, didn't have a good track record of self-governance, or of sensitively handling the power differential between specials and non-specials. A good illustration of which was his own behavior of just a few minutes earlier, when he'd been using Matt's power to coerce answers from her. So it wasn't just the carnies, he thought guiltily.

"And burning people to death!" Audrey added, in unintentional reinforcement of what he'd been thinking. "And not even the shoplifters, but the _police_, who were trying to calm things down." Audrey stood up. "Peter, I think you're trying to be one of the good guys." Her voice returned to normal, trying to be persuasive and call on years of training in manipulating people on the other side of the table from her. "I know you have a regular job, you pay taxes, you live somewhere stable, you have a life. I have some questions I want to ask about what you were doing here last night, and-"

"I was here to stop Samuel Sullivan from killing thousands, maybe more, with that … earthquake stunt he tried to pull."

She sat on the corner of her desk. "But there _was_ an earthquake."

He rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but it didn't open up the ground like one of his sinkholes and swallow all of Central Park like I think he was planning to do."

She blinked and pulled her head back. "Why would he do that?"

Peter shrugged. "I don't know. From what I saw on the news, he did for an entire town somewhere out west. And I know he pulled down a big house near here." He didn't mention the courthouse where Jeremy had been, because having heard what had happened to Jeremy, Peter couldn't find it in his heart to blame Samuel for that one.

"But what does he accomplish with it? That's what I don't get."

This really wasn't the conversation he'd expected to have here, but if it led to more information about Claire, then he didn't mind selling out Samuel. "I think he thought he could scare people into taking him seriously."

"Oh," Audrey smiled and turned her head, "We're taking him seriously, all right."

Peter nodded. "Let's talk about Claire. She wasn't hurting anyone. I've explained what happened. You can let her go now."

"I have a lot more questions than this, Peter. And if you know anything about investigations, we have to interview everyone separately, then we compare notes. That's how it works."

"You don't _need_ her," he said, knowing she wouldn't listen.

"Once we get done with our questions, if she hasn't done anything wrong, then she's free to go."

"What do you even suspect her of?" he said, exasperated. He could hear the suspicion in her thoughts, but it wasn't coming to the surface.

"Now that you mention it, what were you doing last night with Sylar?"

Peter choked. _Does everyone know? _His own guilt, embarrassment, and shame made him color profusely and temporarily blinded him to the fact that Audrey was asking about events at the carnival, not in his bedroom. But now that he'd had such a strong reaction, Audrey's brows had climbed her forehead to hide under her short bangs, a soft, "Oh," passed her lips, and she was suspecting exactly what Peter didn't want her to know. He got out, with difficulty, "Sylar … saved … he saved Emma. He helped. He didn't do anything, um, _wrong_, last night."

"If you say so," Audrey said. "I suppose you'd know better than I would." She eyed him, and his continuing involuntary blush and tense irritation confirmed her opinion that she'd stumbled onto a previously unknown personal relationship. "Maybe you can confirm a theory for me, Mr. Petrelli. Back a few months ago, when we had a little scare that Sylar was going to assassinate the president and take his place, you, your brother, your mother, Claire, Claire's dad, Sylar, Matt Parkman, and a few others all went to the same place, with the same story – 'the big bad Sylar is going to get the president.'" She watched Peter for a moment, untrusting. "You know, I'm normally not a conspiracy nut, but you'd have to be an idiot not to know what the result would be if a group of specials banded together to appear to save the president's life – he'd be grateful. He'd think he owed his life to you. And that's why you're on the kid-glove list now, presidential pardon and all that. It was a good way to get Homeland Security taken off the case of specials as a whole and changed the entire philosophy for dealing with you people. Now what I want to know is, was that whole thing just a setup, from start to finish? Was there ever any _real_ assassination attempt?"

He huffed. "That's what you want to know from Claire, isn't it? And you thought a nineteen year old girl would be easier to twist into saying what you want her to say, so you can go back to persecuting specials just like Danko was doing."

"I'm nothing like Danko," she said, rising from the corner of the desk, lip curling. "Whatever's going on, Peter, it's not healthy for your people. You know that as much as anyone. Your brother's funeral?" She tilted her head, and he could see she had a lot of questions about that, too. No one who knew Nathan could fly would buy the idea that he'd died in an accidental plane crash. "I hear just yesterday Matt Parkman was found dead, murdered, by someone claiming to be Sylar."

Peter's lips pressed together. He supposed Sylar must have idiotically announced himself to the family before killing Matt. But then again, he reminded himself, Sylar hadn't gone there to kill anyone. There might have been a lengthy and frustrating interaction before things spiraled out of control.

Audrey shrugged, pushing out her bottom lip and raising her brows as she shook her head. "And here you are, telling me Sylar spent last night saving people, before going home with you for the night."

"I didn't-" _say he went home with me … Crap!_

"I have witnesses," she said drily, trying to imply she knew more than she did.

"So, what? Are you going to put me on trial for who I sleep with, is that it?" he blurted out.

"When they're serial killers suspected of more than twenty murders and trying to kill the president? I think you have a lot to answer for in your choice of lovers, Peter." She was trying to goad him into confirming or denying and he knew that, but he felt a strange resistance to denying it even though he knew that was what he _should_ be done.

Instead, he replied, "Well, I'm not answering to _you_." He turned and stomped out in an angry huff.


	4. Repair Attempts

**A/N: Warning – more sexual contact of dubious consent. Also, rough sex.**

Peter's conversation with Audrey Hanson had gone well past the point when he should have left. It was only after he was out of the cargo container and standing in the chill, late morning air of New York in winter that he realized how much he'd fucked things up by talking to her. Surely she would just call Building 26 on the phone and tell them to move Claire. It would take him hours to drive there and by then, who knew where she'd be? _I know! Hiro! _He pulled out his phone and dialed. It rang … and rang … and finally voice mail picked up with Hiro's voice chattering excitedly in a Japanese greeting before the beep sounded. Peter left a message in English and stuffed his phone in his pocket, frustrated. _Now what?_

As he stood there trying to formulate a plan, the tall police woman who'd followed him into the green trailer and had been waiting for her turn with Audrey when he'd left, walked up next to him. "Director Hanson said for me to escort you to Building 26 where you're to offer consultation on the Claire Bennet case."

Peter looked up at her blankly. "Why … what?"

In a patient but bored tone, the woman said, "I am to requisition a car, drive you to the airport, and take the next government flight to DC with you, then see to it that you make it to Building 26 safely."

"Why would she order that?" He looked around suspiciously, but it was only the one police officer. If they were intending to take him by force, then they hadn't sent enough goons.

"I would assume because that's the most expeditious way to get there."

'Expeditious' struck Peter as a weird word for a standard beat cop to use. "They're probably going to lock me up, too, then."

The cop looked him up and down in an oddly familiar manner and purred, "That wasn't part of my orders, but I'm sure it could be arranged."

"What?" He stepped back, affronted by the inappropriate and unexpected comment.

"I'm sorry," she said. "That was unprofessional of me. Let's go." She turned and walked off, all business now, but there was still a rolling prowl to the way she moved that made Peter cock his head in puzzlement. There was something … something he couldn't quite identify. He followed her, mostly out of curiosity, but also partly because he didn't know what else to do. The government was offering to fly him to DC? Even if it was a trap, it would work best for him if he went along with it for now and made a break for it later. If they thought he had taken the bait, then they might not move Claire after all.

Getting the car, boarding the plane, and taking off was thankfully uneventful. It was good that he had an escort, because no one they ran into had been informed of Peter's trip. That was oddly reassuring, because he was fairly sure that if this were a trap, then all barriers to getting him to his destination would have been removed before they ever reached them. Instead, he had to push a few thoughts to get them through. They ended up as the passengers in a half-empty cargo plane. A tarpaulin barrier shielded the back half of the area from sight. The front half, where they were, was simply empty, open space, aside from a few jump seats that could be folded down from the wall.

Once they were airborne and en route, Peter unstrapped himself from the jump seat and wandered back to see what Hanson's operation was shipping to DC besides himself. The cop he was with went forward to talk with the pilots in their sealed compartment. Behind the blue tarp, Peter discovered they weren't the only passengers on the plane. Three people rested on gurneys locked to the floor. They were unconscious and strapped in place, with tubes he was all too familiar with inserted in their noses. He checked vitals. All seemed stable. The tarp pulled back out of the way and his 'escort' joined him. Her expression didn't show surprise at the sight. Peter wondered how much trouble he'd cause by waking them up. He'd already lived through one plane crash caused by abilities gone wrong in mid-flight. He pressed his lips into a thin line and decided he'd be better to wait until they had landed.

His companion had moved over to the medical equipment stowed to the side, and was rifling through it. "I hope you're just looking for aspirin," Peter said.

"I don't think the principle behind 'painkillers' is one they understand," she murmured back, apparently finding whatever it was she was seeking. She stood and the stolen articles were slipped into a pocket without Peter being able to make out what they were. Despite his ingrained disapproval of theft of medical supplies, he decided that in the grand scheme of things, stealing a little from the government wasn't that big a deal. It certainly wasn't on the scale of what he was contemplating – letting these people go altogether.

"What do you think of all of this?" Peter asked. Early on, he'd discovered he couldn't read her thoughts without getting a stab of pain, as though she were a telepath, too. But it wasn't exactly an ability that was visible, nor was the reaction conclusive. There were several abilities he knew of personally that blocked telepathy, and he didn't put it past the government to have an injection or mechanical device that did it as well. He'd asked and been told merely, "I'm on your side," without getting a good chance to find out what that meant.

"What I think about it doesn't matter, does it?"

"What, you're just going to follow orders when the government is telling you to lock up kids?" He gestured at the girl who was strapped down, the youngest of the trio. "Her name's Amanda, by the way. I don't think she's more than 15. I met her once. She's a nice kid. She was having some trouble, but we all go through that."

"Some worse than others," the woman said, gazing at the unconscious teen.

Peter sighed. The idea of tap-dancing around his intentions for the entire two-hour plane ride wasn't appealing. He wanted to know what it meant that this woman claimed to be on his side. "I'm not going to let this happen. When we land, I'm letting these people go."

The cop's eyes lifted to his, eerily distant. "I would expect nothing less from you."

He cocked his head. Something just really, really wasn't right here. "Do I know you?"

"Amanda was the one personally responsible for burning two policemen to death. It was the act which precipitated all the other violence. Are you really going to forgive that?"

Peter frowned. "She's a _kid_. Get her _help_. Don't just lock her up in a cell somewhere and throw away the key. What good does that do anyone?"

"It would probably do a lot of good to the people she didn't have an opportunity burn to death in future. The people who died had families – wives, daughters ... brothers. What sentence would they impose?"

"They don't get to impose the sentence. We don't have a society that lets victims or victim's families set punishments. That's the whole idea behind the 'jury of your peers' thing."

"Specials don't have peers, Peter. Each and every one of us is alone."

"No, we're not. We're going to stick together. Amanda needed a family. That's what she was looking for when I met her before. She needed people whom she could depend on."

"She needed a connection."

"Exactly." Peter's brows drew together. _Wait …_ "Sylar?" he said uneasily. There was something in the head tilt and twitch of eyebrow that told him he was right. To Peter's own surprise, he found himself smiling in relief, not just at the mystery of the woman resolving itself, but also … he was weirdly happy to see the guy. Or, sort of see him. Peter looked up and down the form Sylar was wearing. She was good-looking, in an intimidating, Grace Jones sort of way. Sylar had managed to find a woman even taller than himself to duplicate – no mean feat.

That woman strode out of the section with the gurneys, returning to the empty hold with the closed pilot compartment on the far side. Peter followed, taken completely by surprise when she turned, gripped him with telekinesis, and shoved him against the side of the aircraft. She pressed herself to him, lifting him for a probing, take-no-prisoners kiss. Sylar didn't ask him how he felt about it, didn't stop to see if he was interested. She (he?) wrapped fingers into Peter's hair and shoved her tongue inside his mouth, swallowing him down and letting him feel every inch of the tight, firm body flush with his.

It was such a fucking turn-on. His nerves sizzled, his body lit up, his heart thudded in his chest and his skin heated. He didn't give a damn who it was or what they'd done. The suddenness had taken away the option of thinking it over, weighing his scruples, and it wasn't like he hadn't already allowed more … so much more.

Peter was gasping by the time she was done, but Peter didn't want to be finished. "Come here. Come here." He wriggled, feeling the telekinetic hold relax off his arms, allowing him to reach and pull her (him?) close again. He hugged and nuzzled, pushing Sylar back enough to look in her face. "First time we've ever kissed." He looked at the woman's dark eyes. Sylar's were a lighter shade of brown, he thought. Her thin brows just didn't seem right, the mental image of the person he was dealing with being so at odds with what his eyes were showing him. "Can we do it again, with you … being you?"

The shape-shift was immediate and a moment later, Peter was dropped down a couple inches with telekinesis. His feet touched the floor now, but Sylar was still keeping him in place. "You prefer this?" Sylar asked, obviously uncertain.

"Yes." Peter reached out, but held where he was, he could only put his hands on Sylar's front. He couldn't quite reach to hook behind his neck or over his shoulder to pull him in. It was frustrating. After a few seconds, he contented himself with touching – chin, cheek, nose, lips. Sylar stood quietly, watching the hand and not Peter's face, not moving in reaction to the examination but clearly allowing it. "Yes," Peter repeated. "I prefer this."

Sylar's eyes finally rose to meet his. "You … want me." It wasn't said as a question, but it came out so doubtful.

The side of Peter's mouth twitched upwards a couple times. His fingers dropped to Sylar's chest and rested there, feeling him breathe deep and fast. "I … do."

Sylar tilted his head as though puzzled, the same expression he'd had the first time he'd pinned Peter to a wall, back in Mohinder's apartment. Sylar said, "I don't like not being able to read you. Take regeneration."

For Peter, Mohinder's apartment wasn't a good memory. Besides, he didn't like being told what to do. He pulled his head back until it was resting on the netting that lined the wall of the cargo hold. "Maybe I don't want you reading me."

"Take it!" Sylar took Peter's hand, squeezing it like he thought that might force the transfer.

His vehemence caused something to click in Peter's mind, remembering Sylar suggesting regeneration last night and then resisting when Peter tried to take something else that morning. And here they were, minutes from Sylar disclosing his identity, and he was trying to push the same ability on him again. "Are you trying to … protect me?"

"You're my connection, Peter. You can't be that if you're dead," Sylar said by way of confirmation. But as positive as it made Peter feel to have someone looking out for him, he was still feeling stubborn about not letting Sylar dictate what ability he carried. Sylar looked down at their joined hands, where nothing was happening. Then he looked up, eyes dark under heavy brows. "If you don't take it, I will _make_ you."

Peter laughed in his face. "I'd like to see you try."

"I'm sure you will," Sylar promised.

Peter wasn't even done laughing when Sylar spun him in place, his jeans opened themselves, and the garment was jerked to his calves, exposing him. Peter's head whipped to the side, staring in the direction of the cockpit.

Sylar didn't need telepathy to know what Peter feared (and it was more than a little darkly perverse that he was more afraid of being seen by the pilots than molested by Sylar). Sylar cupped his body from behind, dragging his lips along Peter's cheek before breathing, "They won't bother us. I made sure of that earlier. Though if it turns out you're a screamer, they might get curious." Sylar rolled his head, rubbing the tip of his nose across the side of Peter's. "But I already know what sounds you make when I fuck you." Sylar's hands slid down Peter's hips, circled his buttocks, and kneaded them firmly. Peter grunted and pressed the side of his face into the netting, mouth opening as he panted with desire.

Sylar took a moment to drop his own pants to mid-thigh before resuming his explorations with a hand sliding up Peter's inner thigh. Ever cooperative, Peter spread for him. "Oh yes," Sylar purred, forehead pressed to Peter's left shoulder blade. He fondled Peter's balls and they reflexively tightened, skin wrinkling. Sylar chuckled, fingers reaching beyond to touch at the base of Peter's erect dick, before sweeping back again to trace his crack.

"Yeah," Peter whispered, his assent lost in the drone of the jet engines, but he wasn't sure Sylar would have stopped had he refused. He supposed he might have been able to make it not worth Sylar's while, but that was the last thing on Peter's mind. He didn't have much conscious thought going on at the moment anyway. He was lost in a wash of feeling and being felt, sensing and being sensed. Peter groaned softly as Sylar pushed at him with his fingers, then withdrew them for a moment, and replaced them wet. They breached him without preamble and Peter huffed out a sound. Sylar's fingers slid in, pushed, rotated, curled, and stretched him. Sylar raised his head and bit Peter on the shoulder, hard enough through the cloth to make Peter wince and choke on a whimper. He could feel Sylar's erection hot and needy against his buttock.

A little more fingering had Peter pressing his ass back onto Sylar's hand, begging for more. His own fingers curled into the netting. He didn't know if telekinesis still held them there or not – nor did he care. He wasn't about to distract from things by checking his limits. Sylar shifted and pressed against him. With no lube other than that he'd used on his fingers and what precome was wetting the head of his cock, it wasn't going to work. Peter was too nervous, too keyed up to take him that dry. "No!" he said sharply. "No, don't hurt me like that. Please, Sylar." He twisted as much as he could to look back, trying to convey that he was serious and whatever game Sylar was playing, Peter didn't want this to be part of it.

"But I need to hurt you, Peter." Sylar humped him slowly, cock sliding up and down the groove of his ass. "My whole plan is to leave you _aching_ with there being only one way you can remedy it." Sylar reached up, putting his hands over Peter's and lacing his fingers over them. "If you don't want me to, then take regeneration."

Peter growled and put his head down, teeth bared. He was not about to give in to the threat.

Sylar pulled his hands back and fiddled for a moment with something. A hand returned to his crack, and to his relief, a little more lube was spread on him. He could feel it cool and slick on the head of Sylar's cock as it nudged against him, Sylar's other hand steadying it. "Whenever you want to end this, Peter, you can." He pushed in with a short, solid thrust. Peter grunted loudly, snapping his teeth shut over the noise as much as he could.

Sylar wasted no time in putting his plan into motion, allowing no lengthy or considerate period for Peter to adjust. Once firmly seated, he started fucking him hard, fast, and vigorously, with ramming thrusts that left Peter struggling for breath. It was terrible at first, painful and wretched as his pent-up body refused to relax enough to let it be pleasurable, and Sylar refused to do anything for him. Peter finally gave up on trying to hold it in and not show that it was hurting him. He let it out, groaning and keening into the netting, hanging onto it and letting Sylar abuse him. When he finally loosened, he had a new problem, which was the friction. He knew it had to be pulling and dragging on Sylar as well, but with regeneration … yeah. They might both be feeling the burn, but Sylar's body continually healed him from such a minor aggravation. For Peter's, though, every shove inside of him was a cumulative torture. He felt like he was being rubbed raw and torn apart. Very soon, he was aching as promised, and after that he just _hurt _– badly, beyond sore, a pain that made him weak in the knees and his breath started to catch unevenly in rough gasps every time Sylar shifted hard, brutal, and unceasing inside of him. The pain hazed his mind so much he couldn't remember why he was allowing this and if there was anything he could do to stop it. He felt helpless.

Sylar paused and it took Peter way too long to realize the motions had stopped. He was breathing hard and unevenly, chest heaving, fingers curled white-knuckled into the netting. He was sure now that telekinesis was holding him up, because otherwise he'd have fallen well before now. Sylar reached around him, hand slipping up under his shirt, caressing his chest and abdomen tenderly in jarring contrast to how roughly he'd treated Peter's other side. His hand swept down to Peter's groin, passing over his entirely limp dick and hesitating. "You're not turned on at all." He sounded worried.

_He sounded worried._ Peter couldn't wrap his mind around that. Maybe he'd be able to later, but right now it made no sense.

Tensely, Sylar said, "If I could hear your thoughts, then I'd know what you wanted from me!"

_It's my fault?_ Peter made a noise that was either a sob or a laugh. He didn't know which. "Let me go," he said hoarsely.

Sylar released him, withdrawing himself (which was less painful than it could have been; he was losing his erection fast), and took a short, half-step back as Peter turned. His dark eyes were inscrutable, studying Peter intently.

Peter stared at the guy who had killed him, saved his life, been his brother, killed his brother, fucked him, and fucked him up. It all came back to Sylar – every road of Peter's life. It was like they were bound together by fate. Unsteadily, Peter bent and loosened the laces on one of his shoes, pulling his foot out of it and thereby out of the leg of his pants. Laboriously, he bent to repeat it on the other foot. Sylar braced him with a hand on his shoulder. Peter stood and with a stretch, pulled his shirt off over his head, dropping it to the floor on top of his other clothes. He stood naked now (aside from socks), defenseless, possessed of an ability he couldn't even use effectively on Sylar now that he didn't have the advantage of surprise. And he hurt inside. His eyes dropped for a moment as he caught his breath. It was more than just physical pain. There was something else there, so close to the surface. It was something he usually kept buried so deep – that feeling of … helplessness, worthlessness, inability. The pain had worn away his armor and crumbled his walls. Peter just wanted comfort, acceptance, and approval. He didn't want to be hurt.

"You need your connection; I need mine." He pulled Sylar in for a kiss, feeling the other man's initial hesitation. As soon as their lips met, Sylar's eyes rolled up and his lids fluttered shut, overcome with pleasure or some kind of sensory overload. He stood very still as Peter tasted him for the first time, tongue licking lazily across Sylar's full lips, then slipping inside. Sylar groaned, a deep rumble in his chest. "Mmm," Peter answered, hands sliding up and down Sylar's arms. He liked what he was getting. It was delicious. One hand snaked behind Sylar's head, tilting him as Peter mouthed at him harder. Peter's desire ignited inside of him, going from a spark to a flame in seconds. A moment later, Sylar sucked in air and started kissing in return. The flame exploded into a bonfire. Sylar pushed him backwards against the netting and Peter knew, even if Sylar wasn't reading his mind, he was reading him somehow, responding to his needs.

Or at least some of them. "Touch me," Peter whispered, taking one of Sylar's hands and guiding it to his cock, an organ Sylar had heretofore skirted around, but never made full contact with. "You have some lube?"

Sylar's other hand rooted around in his pocket, pulling out a medical dispensary packet, probably one he'd filched from the med-packs earlier. He squirted it onto his hand and slowly, carefully, watching what he was doing, Sylar eased his hand around Peter's member.

"It's just like touching yourself," Peter said, getting a sense of how limited Sylar's experience was with this. It explained a lot. The hand caressed him gently at first. Sylar put his other hand to the back of Peter's head, leaning in as he kept watch on what he was doing. So careful. Peter leaned back against the netting, letting his eyes close and head fall back. This was so delicate, so perfect, such a counterpoint to previously. It buoyed his battered spirit. Peter's hands roamed up and down Sylar's body, accepting the, "No, you'll distract me," when he tried to return the hand job and moving back to stroking flat, hairy planes of belly and sides, reaching up under Sylar's shirt to do it.

Peter was hard, so hard, and trying to thrust into Sylar's fist. He wanted more – more forceful, like it had been before. He wanted that level of passion and drive and desire from Sylar. Not this too-careful version. "Can you hold me up with telekinesis like before? There are more positions than rear-entry, you know."

Sylar looked up at him, mouth opening in a predatory smile. Peter felt the ability take hold of him, lifting and supporting. He spread his legs, feeling a sharp twinge. He wondered if he was bleeding. He wondered if this was even safe. Or sane. _Probably not._ "Use a lot more lube," he warned.

Sylar applied the entirety of a second packet, smearing himself copiously, then Peter. Peter gritted his teeth and clung to Sylar at the touch. "Are you certain this is what you want?" Sylar asked.

"I'm certain I want your shirt off," Peter answered. _And that I'm not taking regeneration on your terms._

Sylar blinked at him and complied. Peter stroked all that pale, exposed skin with furry patches in all the right places. He drew him close, feeling Sylar line up and push inside. Despite being slick and smooth, Peter's ass was super-sensitized by the rough usage it had been put through. He cried out, fingers digging in. Sylar's hand flew to his mouth, muffling him. Peter bit him – not hard, but firmly enough to make Sylar jump and stare, not sure what he was up to. Then a wicked smile creased his face and he picked up the pace.

It hurt, but it felt fantastic with that hot, hard length inside of him, soothing and irritating at the same time. Peter moaned under Sylar's stifling hand, feeling himself free to make any noise he wanted, and making plenty of them. Most were pained at first, but then they transformed to sounds of ecstasy and awe at the sensations sweeping through him. Sylar had one hand on his mouth and the other on Peter's dick, quickly working out a pattern of hip thrust and hand pump. Peter let himself go, hanging on and letting the endorphins carry him away. Beyond agony, beyond pleasure, is a euphoria that he'd unintentionally entered. He felt like he was flying, propelled along by every surging wave of sensation. Head cast back, mouth slack, eyes rolled upwards, his body trembled in readiness for release.

Then Sylar stopped.

Sylar leaned forward, licking a slow trail from the join of Peter's collarbones over his Adam's apple and to the underside of his chin. Teeth nipped lovingly at him. "Show me how special you are, Peter. Use your ability."

"What?" The realization that Sylar might hold out on him, might cut him off and not give him anything more shot through him. He scrambled, wriggling his legs and trying to get purchase. If he fucked himself on Sylar's dick just a little more, would he come? Could he get enough stimulation that way?

Sylar kissed around the corners of his mouth, smoothing his hand to the back of Peter's neck. "Please, Peter," he said, drawing it out as a prayer against Peter's lips. "Use me, like I was meant to be used. For you, by you. Let me take care of you." His voice shook with powerful emotion, like he was asking Peter for life itself. "Let me mean something." He ended by staring into Peter's eyes from inches away, his hip rolling slightly to move himself inside of Peter; his hand on Peter's shaft giving the slowest squeeze and pull.

It was a request Peter couldn't deny, but he still wasn't going to do it on Sylar's terms. He tingled – his whole body did at every point they were in contact – and he picked exactly what he wanted. But it wasn't regeneration.

Sylar made a gaping grin of victory, immediately shifting to hammering Peter hard and fast like he had before. Peter shouted – in pain, in pleasure, in perfect, prolonged completion. Sylar didn't put a hand over his mouth this time, but instead his throat, pressing him to the netting over the wall and throttling him. Peter came and it felt like he just kept coming over and over as Sylar pounded into him, pinning him in place, denying him air but providing everything Peter needed more. He tingled. Sensation roared through him. Sylar's hips snapped a last, decisive lunge inside of him, before his snarl was replaced by a look that was almost frightened, it was so vulnerable. Peter watched him come as if through a haze, pawing at Sylar's hair and petting his face. Sylar collapsed slowly to the floor, releasing the telekinesis and bringing a clinging Peter with him.

Peter felt like he had been torn open. He felt like that broken, jagged part of him that was deep inside, the part he kept hidden and protected, had finally been reached and all his protections had been pushed aside. He had no barrier, no defense against Sylar's essence. It invaded him, filled him, covered him. He was breathing it in. He wanted to be one with it, pushing his face against Sylar's and sucking in lungfuls. Peter rubbed his cheek against Sylar's face, smelling and tasting him while his hands bunched and carded through the man's hair and slid over the top of his sweaty shoulders. He felt like something had changed inside of him, some pair-bonding part of his brain was working on overdrive. He accepted Sylar in every way – caretaker, brother, lover, partner. He wanted to climb inside of him and live there.

Sylar shifted, pulling out. He reached between them to touch Peter's swollen, violated asshole like he had after the first time they'd fucked. Peter winced. "You didn't take regeneration," Sylar said uncertainly.

A slow, smug smile cracked Peter's face. "Something even better." He laid his lips over Sylar's and activated his new treasure. He pulled out Sylar's deepest needs and desires, opening him up just like Peter had sensed he'd been stripped and made naked to Sylar's heart. Peter knew that embarrassment and shame raced through Sylar, and a feeling that he was going to be rejected, found unworthy, and it would all be for naught. But a tiny hope flickered there, a tiny hope that made Sylar keep kissing him. If this was what fate wanted for him, if this was his destiny, if this was the connection he had to have to be human, then he would give himself to it entirely – no shrinking, no fighting, but a total surrender to reality and whatever it held for him.

It felt like they kissed for an eternity, until Peter's mind couldn't hold everything he knew, his heart filled to bursting with what he felt. He separated, finally, and they sat quietly for long minutes, arms around each other, foreheads resting against each other, both staring down sightlessly. It was a lot to process. Peter moved one hand up and cupped the back of Sylar's neck, transferring to a different ability. The ache inside of him, which had been building to a highly unpleasant agony, receded and then vanished. He relaxed from a tension he hadn't even realized he'd been holding, sighing in relief as the pain left and only the incredible post-coital buzz was left.

Sylar, his voice slightly slurred, said, "So you finally took what I was offering?"

Peter smiled at him. "I'll take everything you're offering." He turned and leaned back, pulling Sylar down on top of him. He wasn't renewed enough to go again immediately, but their love-making was hardly at an end. They made love this time, slow and sensual, without the urgency of before. Peter had never felt so complete as when he was in Sylar's arms.


	5. Patched Up

They'd barely finished when the plane started descending. "Crap!" Peter said, yanked out of his hazy bliss by the change in pitch. The constant, loud drone had (he hoped) covered the sounds of their sex. As Sylar had promised, they hadn't been interrupted. He gathered up his clothes while Sylar saw to his own. "Did Hanson really tell you to bring me here?"

"No," Sylar answered. That was hardly surprising. "I told her she'd been working too hard, had hallucinated the entire conversation with you, and needed to find her bed and get some sleep immediately. With any luck, we still have hours before she wakes up and realizes what happened – if she does at all, which from what little I saw of her mind, I believe she will."

"What about without luck?"

Sylar shrugged, tipping his head to the side ambivalently. "Then we won't have any problem finding transportation to Building 26."

Peter chuckled as he pulled his shirt on and then turned to finish lacing his shoes. "That's one way to look at it." Once dressed and sufficiently cleaned up using bandaging material, gauze, and sanitation packets from the med-packs, he turned to the three specials. The plane was tilting like they were coming in for landing, but without windows, he couldn't tell. "How much time do we have?"

Sylar shrugged. "I suspect I'm immortal. But as for you, we should move quickly."

Peter arrested for a moment, trying to work that out. "You … you think … we're together now." He realized that sounded like he disagreed with the assessment and corrected. "We _are._" He stood there, floored. This wasn't just a fling – not that he'd thought it was, but he hadn't thought anything about it. This wasn't Sylar following him back to his apartment, fucking him and leaving. The guy was serious, and seriously implying he saw this as a commitment for the rest of Peter's life. Peter swallowed, looking down at the floor, feeling out what that meant to him. He expected to feel terrified and unsure, to have a little voice inside of him telling him to run and reminding him this was a dangerous psychopath who'd killed Peter's brother. Instead, he just felt … settled. Right. Like everything was okay in the world. It was like that broken thing inside him had been fixed somehow. He raised his eyes to Sylar, who was watching him quietly in that hyper-observant manner he had. "Let's move, then," he said softly.

Sylar's lips entertained a small, reassured smile before he turned to the other passengers of the plane and began removing the tubes that fed them the cocktail that suppressed their abilities and kept them sedated. Sylar did two; Peter removed the nearest one, which was for Amanda. He didn't unstrap her yet, not wanting to risk her getting dumped off the gurney due to a bumpy landing. If the screaming pitch of the air rushing past them was any indication – yes, there it was – they touched down, bounced, and then were down again, this time for good.

As soon as the plane stabilized, they started releasing the prisoners. There was Amanda, whom Peter already knew; a muscular, shaved-headed man he didn't know; and an Asian woman with long, black hair who was also a stranger to him. Amanda recognized Peter in return, which was a help. The other two looked at him suspiciously, glancing between Amanda and Peter, then at Sylar, whom they seemed to know.

"Who's he?" the Asian woman asked of Sylar.

Peter gave his own introduction. "I'm Peter Petrelli. I'm an empath … sort of. I can replicate other people's abilities, one at a time."

"He's special, like us," Amanda said, a vote of confidence that seemed to calm the suspicions of the other two. She went on, following the pattern Peter had set even though she was the one whom everyone else knew. "I'm Amanda Strazzulla. I create fire when I'm upset." Her eyes lingered on Sylar longer than Peter was comfortable with.

The big guy nodded and frowned, swinging himself down from the gurney more lightly that one would expect for a man of his bulk, and who was still probably shaking off the effects of sedation. He followed Amanda's introduction, saying, "I am Aviv. I create telekinetic disturbances when I am upset." He looked around the cargo hold as if seeking out an extra reason to be pissed.

The Asian woman said, "I am called Pearl. I create blasts of energy, like bullets."

"When you're upset?" Sylar asked, raising his brows at the apparent pattern.

"Yes." She gave him a cool, dangerous smile. "And any other time I like."

Peter looked at Sylar, waiting, in the silence that fell. Sylar lofted a brow and turned to the others. "You know who I am." No mention of abilities and from the nods from the others, no need. They already knew him from the time he'd been at the carnival. From the wary, standoffish looks Pearl and Aviv gave Sylar, this wasn't necessarily a good thing. Amanda, though, was watching him more worshipfully than anything else.

"Where are we?" Amanda asked Sylar.

"We've just touched down in DC," Peter supplied instead. "They were in the process of sending you to Building 26, probably for long-term confinement." The three nodded, so they'd at least been told what was up before being sedated. "We need a plan." He faced Sylar expectantly. He could feel the plane turning, having completed landing and now preparing to taxi back to where there would be people waiting to unload the cargo.

Non-plussed, Sylar said, "This is _your_ rodeo, cowboy. I'm just along for the rides."

Peter frowned at him, catching the plural. Then he blew it off, because it was a compliment in a way. And regardless, he had more important things to deal with than Sylar making snarky comments about their sex life in front of strangers. (And maybe it would put Amanda off.) He turned to the others. "Do you remember Claire Bennet? Did you see her at the carnival?" All three nodded. "Okay, good. After she jumped off the Ferris wheel, the media talked to her and then the government took her. They shipped her to Washington, DC, to Building 26. Same place they were taking you. We're going to break her out and you, too."

"Where did they take Samuel?" Pearl asked.

"I don't know. I just know where they took Claire." He hoped they would stay on target, and tried to redirect them back to it with the mention of Claire.

"But you were one of the ones who stopped Samuel," Pearl continued.

Peter nodded. "Yes, I did. But I don't know where they took him. The Company took him, not the government."

Pearl's lips pressed together in a thin, disapproving line.

"I think we need to go back to New York and get everyone together," Amanda said. "I could … threaten the pilots and they'd take us there."

Pearl agreed, turning from Peter to the two carnies she knew and trusted. "If we could get Teddy, we could go in invisibly."

Aviv nodded. "Teddy would help." He looked to Peter. "Do we have any weapons?" Despite the disturbing direction of trying to take the plane hostage and return to New York, it was a reasonable question. Aviv got points in Peter's book, but before he could answer-

Pearl interjected, "I don't need a weapon."

Amanda agreed, "Neither do I."

Aviv shook his head at Amanda. "You should not be involved. This is dangerous. You are too young."

Amanda stood up tensely, snarling. "You don't get to say what I can and can't do. _I_ am dangerous!" Her hands burst into flame. Sylar turned and abruptly left the tarp-walled area. "Where's he going?" Amanda said, the fire vanishing instantly.

Peter sighed. "He and I have a goal, which is to get Claire out safely, with as little damage and loss of life as possible. If you'll help us, I'll be grateful. But if you want to do your own thing, that's cool. You're free. Just let us get off the plane first." He turned and followed Sylar out, hoping the ultimatum would get through where he thought more words wouldn't. Besides, they didn't have time to sort out options and decide on their best course of action.

Quietly, Sylar told him, "My efforts of working in a team environment have not always gone well. When there is no clear hierarchy of command, I don't know how to channel my ..." He trailed off, looking pained.

The three were joining them as the plane was pulling to a stop. Peter said, not trying to conceal from them what he was saying, "Even if everyone splits up, it still helps us. It will cause confusion and make our enemies have to split their resources." The three carnies were quiet and appeared somewhat united, so there was that. If Sylar was having difficulty mastering his hunger, then there was always the option of going it alone, just the two of them.

They could hear equipment being rolled up outside. The door to the pilot's compartment opened and a short, dark-complected man stopped in the doorway to the cockpit, blinking at them. Sylar glanced at Peter, snipping, "It would be easier to kill them," before extending a hand that resulted in the man stiffening in place. Sylar stalked over to him. Before he reached the man, he was collapsing to the side, either asleep or unconscious. Sylar went on into the pilot's compartment, presumably to deal with the co-pilot. Peter swallowed and turned back to face the main hatchway.

"Why didn't he kill them, then?" Pearl asked.

"Because murdering people is _wrong_," Peter said without looking at her.

"But they're abducting us!" Amanda said. "They took our homes, said we'd be in prison forever. What happens to them doesn't matter!"

Aviv chided her, "If you had not burned those police last night, perhaps none of this would have happened."

_So much for the illusion of being united,_ Peter thought.

"They started it!" Amanda said desperately, like she was trying to convince herself more than anyone else. Her hands burst into flame again as the people outside chose that moment to open the hatch. She snarled at the surprised strangers outside, who hadn't expected any resistance at all. "They totally started it." The first fireball flew.

XXX

Sylar was not a good driver. Peter made a mental note of this, although there was little to be done about it now that he was in the passenger seat and Sylar had the wheel. The careening of the vehicle had stopped shortly after they'd left the airport and shaken their last pursuers, although Peter suspected they only reason they'd stayed on the road at all was due to supernatural ability nudges, though whether they were from Aviv or Sylar was unclear to him. Aviv had a little more control of his ability than he gave himself credit for, but he was still something of a menace, with things flying around like something out of a horror movie when he was under stress. It made Peter remember his own utter lack of control early on, and appreciate Sylar's precision.

Pearl, on the other hand, was very precise and very steady. Peter did not see this as an advantage because she had no remorse whatsoever about blowing holes in living people – whom Amanda would then set on fire. Or at least she did once, and Peter then spent their rest of their hurried escape running interference and being so fucking thankful Sylar had convinced him to take regeneration. Without it, he would have been dead three times over from his own teammates. The people they were facing weren't really much of a threat. They might have been more of one if bullets or taser darts had been able to get near Peter's group, but Sylar stayed focused on defense, stopping everything harmful from reaching them. He was good at it, but it meant he couldn't spare the attention to stop Amanda and Pearl from taking potshots ('covering fire' they called it) at the relatively defenseless security they had to get past to get out.

Their jailbreak had left two dead. That was what kept going through Peter's head after Sylar finally persuaded the car to stay between the lines - two people with families, lives, hopes, dreams, goals, loved ones, ended because Peter couldn't think of a better plan to get Claire out. There would have been even more casualties if Peter hadn't deliberately intercepted some of the attacks. He was looking at the three people with them in the car and understanding why they'd been on the plane. He wasn't about to say that being locked up and throwing away the key was the answer, but it was like when he thought he was going to blow up New York and the answer then, for him, was to go to the middle of the Nevada desert or allow Claire to kill him. These people needed some time away, apart, somewhere safe, to work out their problems and get some … something. Discipline, maybe.

Sylar reached over and patted Peter's knee sympathetically before going back to driving. Peter looked at him, seeing the tight smile on the man's face. He sighed, remembering that Sylar could read his mind and was almost certainly doing so now that there wasn't gunfire going off all around him. _Is it wrong that I'm considering leaving them in Building 26?_

Sylar shrugged. He was just along for the rides, being strangely loyal, unfailing backup to Peter's plays, whatever those might be. Peter put his hand on Sylar's shoulder, feeling the tension ease inside of him. His mind replayed everything Sylar had done from the time the doors opened until now. He'd been doing it for Peter – avoiding killing, protecting him. It was, 'That's what brothers do for each other' all over, except now with a new twist: 'That's what lovers do for each other.' Such loyalty. What could Peter do to deserve it?

"I'm going to make it safe for all of us," Peter whispered, even if in the confines of the car, the others could hear him. "Claire, you, the carnies … all of us." After a pause he added, "And all of _them_, too," meaning those without abilities.

Sylar gave him as long a look as he dared, then went back to driving.

Pearl piped up incongruously, "Does anyone mind if I smoke?" They'd switched cars shortly after leaving the airport by merely parking, flagging down a passing minivan, and Sylar using Matt's borrowed mojo to force the hapless driver to take the transport vehicle they'd stolen from the airport while they took her Honda. Pearl had gleefully grabbed the woman's abandoned purse and apparently discovered cigarettes.

Peter looked out the window and said nothing, not wanting to risk alienating his team members by objecting. Aviv frowned. Sylar was silent. Amanda cleared her throat. After a few moments of the polite disapproval-by-failing-to-approve, Pearl huffed and said, "Okay, then let me put it another way, is there anyone in the car who's okay with me smoking? I can put a window down."

"We're going sixty-two miles per hour," Sylar observed as a passive rebuttal. Putting a window down at this speed would cause noise and disruption, in addition to doing little to evacuate the smoke.

"I'm immune to smoke," Amanda said helpfully. "But I probably don't get a vote." Aviv and Peter continued to say nothing. Pearl huffed again, even louder.

Sylar changed the subject. "Peter, I know of three efforts that have been made to deal with specials. There's the Company, there's Pinehearst, and then there was the carnival. None succeeded." He hesitated and added, "There is the questionable fourth and fifth attempts of Danko's brand of Homeland Security, and the current one of Director Hanson."

"Three started by specials," Peter said. "Two by non-specials."

"Do you think that makes a difference?"

"I don't know." He sighed, rubbing Sylar's shoulder with the hand that was still resting on it. Oddly, he didn't want to move it. He wanted to be touching Sylar _constantly_, which … well, he'd rarely been _that_ in love with someone. And more rare, had someone allow it, especially this early in the relationship (if he could even call what he and Sylar had a 'relationship'). "You know that call I got this morning?"

"The one that went to voice mail?" Sylar said, a brief, smug smile on his face.

"Yeah, that one. That was my mother." Sylar's smile faded. "She said you were going to destroy everything my family had worked for." Peter was quiet for a moment, his fingers rubbing a large, slow circle. "That probably means what's left of the Company."

"And Pinehearst."

Peter nodded, though he didn't know what was left of Pinehearst to worry about. "The carnival's already ..." He glanced back. Aviv nodded. Although the three in the back seat weren't contributing to the conversation, they were listening.

Sylar said, "And Danko's operation is over. I'm not sure how extensive the new one is."

"It's just getting started." He patted Sylar's shoulder. "I've been thinking about her message this morning and … I think that would be for the best." Sylar looked over at him to be sure. Peter nodded at him. "You know, if you get the chance."

Sylar chuckled ruefully. "The opportunity for destruction is one that comes to me far too often, Peter."

Peter shrugged loosely. "Well, this time it really needs to be done. I think it's long overdue. We can't straighten out the future if we can't get over the past." Sylar gave him another long look, then put his eyes on the road. His hand, though, made a brief foray over to Peter's thigh to give it a pat in return.

XXX

The drive to Building 26 took as long as the flight did, but was much less enjoyable. Still, they had worked out a plan by the end. Once at the building, they simply walked in and started asking questions. Telepathy made short work of barriers. Peter envied it as they rode the elevator up to the floor Claire was supposed to be on.

"Don't," Sylar told him preemptively. "The last time I cared about someone, they got shot and it got me killed. Keep regeneration, Peter. You've already needed it."

Peter shook his head, but he kept to the plan. As they walked down the long hallway, he looked at the exposed piping on the ceiling. Aviv was looking at it, too, and frowning. "What do you think that is?" Peter asked. "I recognize the sprinklers, but what about those others?"

"I hate sprinklers!" Amanda interjected.

Aviv shook his head. "I do not know. Everything on this floor is new construction."

"You've worked in construction?" Peter asked.

Aviv nodded as Pearl snapped, "Is this really the time to be discussing our career choices?"

Sylar stopped and gave her a withering look. Unimpressed, she scowled back at him. Peter pointed out the obvious to distract both of them: "This is Claire's door." Sylar turned back to it. Peter expected him to pull it from its frame, but instead, Sylar studied the lock for a moment. It made a definite click and he pushed the door open. Claire was sitting on a folding chair inside, part of a sandwich halfway to her mouth. She stared at Sylar, who was in the front.

Peter stepped past him with the intention of putting a more welcome face on the rescue party. "Claire. Are you okay?"

"Peter!" She dropped the sandwich and jumped up, running to embrace him. "Yes, I'm fine."

"Come on." But when he started to head back, she hesitated, still looking at Sylar with an expression more perplexed than angry. "He's on our side," Peter said.

"Okay," she said. "Again?" Her question was addressed to Sylar. He made an ambivalent head wobble as reply.

"We wouldn't have gotten this far without him," Amanda said in support.

The group turned to head out. They'd been told there weren't any other prisoners on this level, as the few other inmates were on a different floor, sedated and under medical observation. Peter was torn about that. He wanted them free, but he'd already seen two murders carried out by the three they'd already set loose. Sylar's comment to Pearl asking if her ability also worked only when she was emotionally compromised was a good point. The government's standards for incarcerating people might have changed and though it didn't explain why they had jailed Claire, she wasn't tranquilized, robbed of her ability, or deprived of food, as he'd seen. So he held his tongue about the others for now. "Let's get out of here."

They were halfway down the hall when the alarm went off and the piping on the ceiling began to hiss. He could see, very faintly, the vapor discharging from the non-sprinkler pipes they'd noticed earlier.

Sylar winced, reeling to the side, having not known to turn off the mind-reading before the racket began. Peter grabbed him on one side and to his surprise, Claire took the other. Peter said, "They'll be watching the elevators. Get to the stairs." He covered his mouth with his shirt, hoping the regeneration was why he wasn't feeling any effects from the gas. He could taste the cloying, medicinal odor of it through the shirt. He watched the others to make sure they kept up, but no one flagged on the hustle down to the emergency door.

Amanda got to it first, rattling the push bar, but to no effect. "It's locked!"

Peter and Claire stopped. Sylar shrugged off their assistance, having recovered. Aviv shoved on the door and confirmed, "It is!"

"I'll get it," Sylar said, reaching a hand towards it for telekinesis. His brows drew together and he stared at his hand.

"What is it?" Peter asked.

Pearl ordered the others, "Out of the way. I'll get it if he can't!" She put her hands together in the shape of a gun as Peter had seen her do at the airport, but nothing happened.

"What are you doing?" Claire said in a tone that conveyed just how dumb Pearl looked, pointing her imaginary blaster at the door.

"We've lost our abilities. That's the gas," Sylar said.

"It doesn't smell like the neutralizing gas," Peter said. But it _was _similar, he had to admit.

Sylar grimaced. "That's because there's no sedative component."

"Why would they leave off the sedative?" Amanda asked.

Sylar raised his brows. "Sedation at the variable concentration levels created by gassing large areas is dangerous and potentially lethal. It's either regard for our safety, or so they don't have to worry about gas masks when they send in the non-specials with guns. Or both."

"We're trapped!" Pearl said as they heard doors open in the distance.

Aviv, sweating now and showing a thick Eastern European accent at odds with his appearance, said, "Is government building, right?" Peter nodded. "Then is built to code. Give me fire!" Amanda fluttered her empty hands, but Pearl understood him and yanked out the lighter she'd pocketed from the Honda driver's stolen purse. Aviv took it and went to one of the sprinklers, lighting it and holding it up the flame. He was tall enough to reach it.

"How will that help?" Amanda asked, just as the water started raining down and soldiers or guards – people in military uniforms either way – appeared at the other end of the hall with tasers in their hands.

Aviv said, "Government will not let people die in burning building! Not even prisoners!" He rushed the door with full confidence it would be open now, and to Peter's surprise, he was right. It flew open, locks having been automatically disengaged by the fire abatement system override.

Peter grabbed at Claire and Amanda, herding them out and making sure they went in front of him. Pearl came after. Sylar was last. Peter paused on the stairs as Pearl hurried past him. Sylar was frantically messing with the door. "Come on!" Peter called.

"There has to be a way to lock it!" Sylar answered, just as he was knocked partly back as someone on the other side barreled into the door. For a moment, it stood half-open, excited guards trying to scramble up to finish forcing it and win the passage. Peter dashed back up the stairs and slammed into it just as Sylar righted himself to push back. With the momentum, they got it shut again, but it only stayed that way due to their combined pressure. It was battered twice more from the other side, but Peter and Sylar were able to brace themselves against the railing of the stairway.

The guards paused to argue about what to do. Sylar used the same opportunity to speak. "Peter, get out of here." Peter glanced at him and only moved to brace himself better. Sylar barked, "That's an order!" Peter looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language. Why the hell would Sylar think ordering him around would work any better now than it had earlier? He must be panicked, Peter assumed, which only made Peter more determined to stay with him. Sylar changed tact. "Peter, the gas wears off fast. I'll get my abilities back and be fine, but you _won't_. Protect Claire!"

Peter hesitated. It was a good point. Claire was traveling down the stairs with three highly unstable people who had no loyalty to her. Plus, there would be guards on the stairs in no time. But on the other hand, he'd be leaving Sylar, which he was loath to do for a host of reasons. He didn't even want to be out of sight of him – which had nothing at all to do with danger. He remembered what Sylar had said earlier about the person he'd cared about – 'they got shot and I got killed.' _If I stay here, I make it more dangerous for him because he's going to put himself at risk to protect me._ He shook his head and gritted his teeth, but the truth didn't change just because he didn't like it – Sylar would be safer if Peter got himself out of the line of fire. He turned and ran.


	6. Parted But Not Sundered

Down the stairs Peter went. The hard, concrete stairwell full of even harder metal stairs bounced sound around in a cacophony. He could hear a din like that caused by a stampede of booted feet on the stairs and maybe the noises of a fight, but he didn't know if it was above him, below, or both. He just kept going.

He burst out on the ground floor to find himself behind an advancing line of guards who were already in combat with the specials. Peter barely had time to register the layout before a uniformed woman yelled at him and grabbed his arm, trying to twist it behind him and take him down. He swung with her motion and hit her solidly in the chest with the heel of his free hand. She staggered, losing her grip, but she hadn't had the wind driven out of her like he'd hoped – the protective vest she was wearing was doing its job too well. She reached for her baton. He jumped on her in turn, wresting the weapon from her and giving her a vicious elbow across the face.

Peter scrambled to his feet before reinforcements could join her, dodging past three people struggling with Aviv and four with Pearl. There was a smear of blood across the floor and a splatter on the wall beside him, but both Pearl and Aviv were alive and fighting. A taser dry-fired on Aviv, but Peter's target was the man who had Claire on the ground. He smacked him hard with the stick across the man's armored upper back, avoiding the tempting but potentially lethal head or neck shot. The man let go immediately and looked up in surprise. Claire gave him a solid kick in the side as Peter snatched the taser from the man's hand. Peter gave it a quick glance. It hadn't been discharged yet. He backed up to where Claire was getting to her feet. Peter glanced around for a better assessment.

Most of the guards were occupied with Aviv or Pearl. The one he'd hit and Claire had kicked was getting up. Amanda stood to the side, literally steaming – apparently being doused with water upstairs had slowed the return of her ability. If Aviv or Pearl had their abilities back, it didn't matter, because they were subdued. For all intents and purposes, they were out of the fight. Three other guards formed up in the few seconds he took to figure out what was going on. Amanda's hands ignited and they paused.

Several things flashed through Peter's head at once – those two people dead at the airport; the fact that none of these guards had guns, all had tasers which were agonizing but relatively nonlethal; there were effective safety protocols at work in their holding area even at the risk of prisoners escaping; the blood on the wall was not from any of the specials; Amanda was about to burn these people to death just like she'd done the night before; and the world was not a safer place with any of these three free in it. He turned the taser on Amanda and shot her in the back. He threw down the device while everyone gaped and it buzzed. He grabbed Claire by the arm and they ran out the door.

A fun thing about regeneration he'd never had the opportunity to experience before was how long it allowed a person to run. He didn't get tired. He didn't get winded. His legs propelled him along at top speed without fail or falter. It was really cool. Claire kept right up with him. It wasn't flying and it was conspicuous as hell, but it let them cover several zig-zagging blocks fairly fast. A taxi and a wad of cash later and they were putting even more distance between them and their pursuers. A few miles later, Peter had the driver drop them off at a random Thai restaurant he saw ahead of them.

"What do we do now?" Claire asked after the taxi had left them in the parking lot next to the eatery.

Peter shook his head. "I was here to get you. I … I lost Sylar." He looked back in the direction of downtown, where Building 26 stood. If he had to trade one for the other … he had the sinking feeling that he'd ended up with the wrong one.

"What happened to him – on the stairs?"

"He stayed. He stayed to hold them long enough for us to get away."

"I've seen him do that before," Claire said quietly. At Peter's look, she shrugged. "Sacrifice himself. He's so _weird_." With real heat in her voice, she said, "and inconsistent!" She looked at Peter searchingly, "You trust him?"

_Do I ever._ Peter rolled his eyes at how extreme his emotions had gotten, so fast. His whole world was upside down. But given the state his world had been lately, maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. "Yeah, it's … a pretty strange situation. I don't know how to explain it."

"Okay. Whatever." She shook her head, accepting it easier than he'd expected. "So what now? I don't want to call my dad to have him bail me out like I'm some kid!"

"Huh." Peter leaned against the wall, trying to gather his thoughts. Honestly, calling Noah had been his second thought. His first had been to call Sylar, but he didn't know the man's number. Or even if he had a cell phone. Or even his name, Peter realized. Sure, Peter would call him Sylar, but Peter assumed he had a legal name he used for paperwork, like what was on his driver's license or birth certificate. _But … what if he doesn't have those either? Bad driver, was easily convinced he was my brother, needs help … what if he has real identity problems? Am I equipped to help someone like that?_

Claire was losing it in her own way. "I can't go back to the reporters. I can't go back to the carnival. I can't go back to school. What can I _do?!_"

Peter looked at her blankly, processing that his job, his apartment, his everything was probably off-limits, too.

"That was the point of all of this, Peter!" she said shrilly into his face. "So we wouldn't be hiding anymore! So we'd be accepted, have a home, have a chance to be normal, even if for us 'normal' means regenerating or seeing the future or flying. We have to have lives! They've taken our lives from us!"

He listened to her vent, with her saying things he agreed with.

She turned angry at his passive observation, asking, "I'm serious, Peter. What do we do?"

"We've got to stop acting like we're special."

"What?"

It all came together for him in his head. "We've got to stop acting like we're special cases. We want to be normal? Then let's go through the normal channels."

"The normal channels?" Claire looked hopeful, but confused. "What do you mean?"

"They can't hold us, Claire. There are laws. You're not a terrorist no matter what they say. What have you done wrong? What have you done that allows them to incarcerate you?" She blinked at him without an answer. "That's my point!" Peter stabbed a finger in the direction of Building 26. "There are laws and they're **not** being applied to us. We're not above the law, but we're not below it, either. We're people – citizens," he nodded and Claire nodded slowly back at him. "Let's make the system work for us for a change."

"Okay. I think Sylar's a lost cause, though."

"Why? I'd like to see the evidence they have against him."

"The president?" Claire said, leaning forward with brows raised incredulously like she couldn't believe Peter was missing that.

"When I talked to Hanson this morning, that was what she wanted to get out of _you_. They don't know what happened. Not for real. Not for certain. They don't have enough information to lock people up, Claire."

"Sylar's killed a lot more people than that."

"I know," Peter said, voice glum on that. "But no matter how I feel about him right now, he's not the only one in danger."

Claire blinked at him a few times. "Okay, Peter … I'm going to blurt something out right now that sounds really ridiculous and you might find really offensive. But … are you seriously telling me you have 'feelings' for Sylar?"

Peter covered his face with both hands as he leaned against the brick side of the building.

"Oh my God," Claire said quietly when he didn't rush to deny it.

He dropped his hands. "Please don't hate me, Claire. We really need to-"

"No, no! That's …" She trailed off laughing. "Are you sure he didn't mind control you or something?"

"I'm sure." Actually, not really, but he wasn't about to consider it. He _liked_ the way he felt. As long as Sylar returned them, Peter didn't care where his feelings came from.

"Okay. Well, I stabbed him in the eye with a pencil when he tried to tell me we were soul mates day before yesterday, or whenever it was. I guess he told you the same thing and you bought it, then?"

Peter frowned at her. The idea that just a couple days ago, Sylar had been trying to convince Claire to be his life partner … "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying Sylar's _desperate_." She made a 'don't you get that?' face at him, like Sylar's need made him an instant pariah and Peter was a fool for thinking differently. Then she thought better of it. "Okay, well, I'm sorry. That's really not … I mean, that's not ..." Her voice softened and she deflated, looking down. "That's kind of sad."

"He's been going to people looking for help," Peter said quietly, summing up the real meaning of what had happened between Sylar and Claire recently.

Claire nodded, raising her eyes to Peter. "I told him to get rid of all his abilities. I guess he couldn't?"

Peter sighed. "No. He tried, though. He went to Matt Parkman, asked him for help, and Matt tried to imprison him in a mind-trap forever. Sylar killed him." He wondered if Matt's life would have been saved if Claire had tried to help Sylar instead of telling him to do the impossible and divorce himself from his powers.

"Sylar … oh." She looked sad. "Matt – he was the telepath, right?"

Peter nodded. "I found Sylar there. I'd had a dream he'd save everyone at the carnival. And … he did."

"What … did you do anything about Matt?" She shrugged helplessly. "I mean, I don't know what you _could_ do."

"We cleaned him up, and his house."

"'We'?"

"Yeah," Peter looked determined. "I made Sylar help. I told him what to do and he did it."

She blinked at him. "And he didn't kill you, too?"

"I was … it was a little scary there at first, yeah." He smiled slightly. He'd been terrified in the beginning. "Then he followed me to the carnival and saved people. I told him not to kill anyone again and … he said he'd do that."

"It's that simple?"

"Nothing's that simple, Claire. But the common denominator to succeeding at something is _trying_. He's trying to be better. You said earlier he'd tried before. One of these times, he's going to succeed. And I'm going to be there for him when he does." He said the last firmly.

Claire blinked at him again. "Okay. Then … you said he wasn't the only one. Let's get to work on that. How do we start?"

"Let's go back to that Director Hanson and find out where we stand. No, wait, let's get an attorney, then have the attorney talk to Hanson. If we're legal, _then_ we can talk to her." Peter stared at the ground for a moment. "Did you know my father had a law firm?"

"No." When he looked up at her, Claire said, "I really don't know much about your side of my family."

"There's a lot I don't know either, or that I thought I knew and I've found out I was wrong. I think we can get train tickets to New York just using cash. Let's get some Thai food to go and I'll tell you what I know on the way."

XXX

"Do you always carry this much cash?" Claire asked as they boarded the train.

Peter laughed. "Homeland Security froze my accounts a few months ago when they put me on the terrorist list. I don't know if that's sorted or not, but I've stayed away from banks since then. I just got paid Friday."

"If we're going to pay lawyers, aren't we going to need more money than you're carrying?"

"Yes. My father's law partners specialized in laundering money. I'm sure they'll be able to help." As they took their seats, he said, "One of the things we've got to address is what the government is doing that interferes with specials living normal lives. It's been hell for me to keep a job and being an EMT is actually pretty flexible. I can understand why the carnival was so attractive, or even the Company. It's a paycheck, in addition to being a place where you're accepted for what you are."

"Did you know that Elle came to my house once when he ability was malfunctioning, because she said she didn't know anyone else who might help her?" Claire shook her head in disbelief.

"We need to change that. Samuel wouldn't have had that sort of grip over his people if they had options. He came to me, but I had a job. I have a family. I didn't want to join the carnival. I had a life of my own. That's what let me say no to him."

Claire nodded. "There was definitely a creepy vibe going on there."

"It's a cult thing," Peter confirmed. "People put up with abuse when they don't see any better options. And you end up with the predators preying on everyone and no one being able to do anything about it."

"Like how the government is preying on _us_ right now."

"Exactly."

"Well," Claire said, settling herself. "Tell me about your family."

He laughed at the change in subject. "I'll tell you what, if you want to talk about predators preying on people, the Petrellis are a good topic." He rolled his eyes. "You know about my mother's side as well as I do, because when she told all of us at Coyote Sands, that was the first I knew of it. Before that, she'd always been vague. I mean, I knew the Shaw name because she'd given it to me for the family tree I made for school, but I didn't know anyone from that side – no names, no history, nothing. She said she'd lost touch with everyone after she left home. I always thought she'd run away or there had been a disaster, which I guess is true, but not the way I thought."

He continued, "On the paternal side, we have Uncle Tim whom you haven't met, and Arthur, my dad, who's probably dead now."

"Probably?"

Peter shrugged helplessly. "I thought he was dead before, too. He was in the military, which is where he met Daniel Linderman and some of the others. When they'd come over to the house, I always thought they were just friends from way back. I never knew they had abilities. I didn't know abilities existed until … about the time I met you." He smiled at her.

"So you had a normal childhood, then?"

"I guess. Normal enough. I was rich – you've seen the house. With a twelve year gap between Nathan and me, I was kind of an only child. I was pretty lonely. The earliest I can remember, Nathan had a car and usually girlfriends. He made time for me, but you know, he was _making _time for me. I always felt like I was competing with everything else in his life for his attention and maybe I was too grateful for the crumbs I got." Peter scratched at the back of his fingers. "It wasn't like there was anyone else around. My mom was there some, but my dad almost never was. It's hard to ask a lot of questions of people when they aren't even there."

Claire frowned. "Peter, that sounds awful." She sounded torn between being authentically sympathetic and making light of it.

He laughed and gave her a little shove. They both laughed.

She said, "I always had Lyle and my mom. I couldn't get away from Lyle. Oh my God, it is so annoying to have a little brother sometimes! But Mom was _always_ there."

"And Noah?"

She shook her head and rolled her eyes. "Sometimes, yeah, he'd be home for like a month or a few weeks, but then he'd be back on the road, 'selling paper'."

"Uh-huh," Peter nodded.

"It's funny," she said, "Sylar listed out all these reasons why he and I should be together, but they were stupid reasons."

"What were they?"

"That we were both adopted, basically. And that our main father figures were killers."

Peter waited, but she didn't go on. "That's not much."

"I know!" she nodded. "I told him that. He didn't …" She shook her head now. "Like I said, he was desperate. He thought I would be his connection to the normal world. I wasn't."

"No, that's me," Peter said quietly.

She regarded him for a long moment. "And you're okay with that?"

He shrugged one shoulder. "I'm … finding that I'm … a little more than okay with that." He couldn't stop the stupid smile from creeping on his face as he thought about how he felt about Sylar. He started laughing because it was really ridiculous. Just the day before, he'd walked in on the guy at a murder scene, but now … well. All was forgiven, because Peter was in so deep he couldn't see out.

Claire gave him another long look, then smiled and shook her head. "That's crazy, Peter. Is it insensitive for me to bring up Nathan?"

"No, it's not." He shook his head. "I don't- I don't even know, Claire. He wants to make it work; I want to make it work; and at the end of the day, isn't that all it takes?"

"Uh, no. Earth to Peter – it takes a little more than that."

"Yeah, okay, it takes a little more than that. But he and I have a lot more in common than 'adopted'. He's backing me up, Claire. He's trying to be there for me."

"You miss Nathan a lot, don't you?"

"I'm not thinking he's Nathan," Peter bristled. "That is nowhere in this."

"Okay, okay," she said, offering her hands in surrender. "I was just saying that you've lost someone recently who … who you looked up to and expected to be there for you – the guy you went to when you needed help. He's gone. So maybe that's making someone else who will do that for you look more attractive than they might be otherwise."

He frowned at her. "Claire? You know the best thing you can do for me in this?"

"What?"

"Do just what you're talking about – be there for me. And I'll be here for you. We've got something big to get through here and I need your help."

She smiled softly. "Okay. I've got your back." Her smile grew a little wider. "At least until Sylar takes over the job."


	7. Hanson

Peter smacked his hand down on his father's desk, his mouth a thin line at hearing about yet another delay. Harvey Cross, one of his father's old law partners, jumped at the noise. He still wasn't comfortable with the idea that Peter had an ability, even if it was as harmless as regeneration. "Harvey, there are people whose lives are on hold, who have no future, while we're in here discussing this. They don't have time for us to take _months_ making sure the government's case files are thorough enough, that they have all their i's dotted and t's crossed." Peter exhaled heavily. "In the end, it's going to come down to two people making an agreement. Find out who the government thinks that person is and get me in a room with them."

Going to court in the United States might have once been the opportunity for a case to be judged on its merits in front of a judge and possibly a jury, but for the last several decades, a court trial was nothing but a ridiculous show that made for good television. The vast majority (more than 98%) of legal arguments were handled by negotiation and agreement. 'Plea bargains' they might be called when the government was prosecuting you. 'Out of court settlements' for civil disputes, when you were bringing suit against someone else. In Peter's case, they hadn't even reached the point of deciding who was prosecuting who or for what. All he knew was that the government had made no charges against himself or Claire in relation to their dramatic jailbreak. And more importantly, they still had Sylar.

For the first few days after the escape, Peter had been a mess of anxiety waiting for Sylar to come back. He kept hoping Sylar's powers had returned in time and he'd fought his way out, but just hadn't known where to look for them. It was part of why Peter's first priority after throwing off pursuit was to go right back to his apartment, even though it was the perfect place for the authorities to pick him up. And for the following days, he told himself that might be why Sylar wasn't there – it was too obvious, too dangerous. Maybe he was waiting for Peter to join him somewhere else. Peter racked his brain, but he couldn't think of where, so he spent a lot of time moving around the city, visiting Isaac's loft and Deveaux's roof and Nathan's house, all for nothing. Finding Sylar was much more important than avoiding the law, so it was a lucky thing for him that the law wasn't making any active attempt to find him.

He did retain the presence of mind to clear up his financial issues and contact several of his father's former law partners. After meeting each, he settled on one as being the most skilled and available to handle such a case. Peter was contemplating a class action suit against the government. That's what they were framing it as, though the PATRIOT Act and various other anti-terrorist bits of legislation were going to make it difficult to win in the legal arena. And while that was where the ultimate victory would be, the main battles were probably going to be personal. The more he reviewed the information Cross had presented to him, the more he studied on his own, the more he talked with Nathan's former associates in the DA's office, the more certain Peter was that the suit was a formality – a necessary one, but just the icing on the cake.

'Play to your strengths' – it was an adage Peter had heard many years ago. His strength was not in the fine points of the law. That was why he had a staff of lawyers working on the case. His strength lay in his people skills. What he needed to do was get some face time, find out what the other side wanted, and work on getting it for them.

XXX

Peter waited in an unnecessarily opulent room at the Cross' firm. Harvey had shoe-horned Peter into a suit. He supposed appearances mattered a lot with some people, but he didn't think they pulled much weight with Audrey. Regardless, here he was in the same outfit he'd last worn to his brother's funeral, legs crossed ankle-on-knee, restlessly tapping his thumb against one knee.

He sat up when Audrey Hanson entered only a few minutes later, promptly on time. She was dressed in a light grey suit. Aside from being clean, neat, and expensive, it proved out Peter's opinion that appearances weren't her thing. She took her seat across the table from him, an expanse of smooth, polished cherrywood between them. "So," she started. "The meeting you asked for?"

"Are you holding Sylar prisoner?" It was something he already knew, but wanted to make clear from the outset. Their ground rules were fairly simple – no witnesses, no recording devices, no abilities, and nothing said was binding or incriminating. Not that Peter planned to admit to anything anyway. Basically, they were just talking.

"Yes," she answered.

"On what charge?"

"Attempted assassination of the president of the United States."

"How do you know it was him?"

"Peter, you were standing next to your brother when the accusation was made. Later, you were the one who told the president's staff so you could assume his shape."

"Then you admit it's hearsay?" Peter raised his brows questioningly for a moment before continuing, "I got my ability from a shape-shifter who looked exactly like Sylar when I took it. How do you know it was the same person you're holding in a cell now?" Audrey frowned at him. "We burned a body. Even _we_ thought it was Sylar's."

"I have a file on Sylar's murders that goes back half a decade, Peter."

Insistently, he repeated, "How do you know the person you're holding in a cell right now is the same person who did any of those things?"

"What are you suggesting?"

"What if it's just someone who gets off on having a bad reputation and the easiest way to get it was to assume Sylar's identity?"

"That's kind of stupid, don't you think?"

Peter shrugged. "Some people will do anything to be special."

She eyed him, weighing the different meanings of the words. "A special kind of stupid, perhaps. Be that as it may, I have something that makes all of your sophistry irrelevant."

Peter's brows drew together. She looked way too serious. "What? What do you have?"

"A confession."

Peter's eyes widened. "What did he confess to?"

"Everything – president, murders, even several we hadn't known about. He confirmed it all and then some. So we meet all of that 'burden of proof' stuff you're shoveling."

"What did you do to him?" Did they torture him? Mind control? Drugs?

"Nothing."

Peter shook his head. "Sylar wouldn't tell that for no reason. He isn't that dumb. What did you _threaten_ to do to him?"

"Hm," she considered, then answered, "Nothing."

"Why would he tell you that?!" His emotions were rising, frustrated at how Sylar had sunk himself and frightened about how this complicated Peter's efforts to free him.

"You aren't the first one, Peter," she said drily, "to sit across a table from me and try to work a deal."

"What- what could you offer that would be worth telling you all of that?" His voice rose. "That's a life sentence, at best!"

"At best? I don't think they'd give someone like that life even in a best case scenario."

"Then what did you offer?" Peter snarled, coming up out of his seat. Tears were forming in his eyes as he sensed he was going to lose Sylar, possibly forever.

She sat impassive for a long moment, savoring his agony. She tilted her head insouciantly to the side and said, "You."

"What?" Peter faltered, falling back into his chair as he realized, but pretended not to, what she meant. Maybe if he pretended hard enough, it wouldn't be true.

"Full immunity for you. And Claire Bennet. But mostly for you." Her expression strayed briefly into sadness for him, like she had some empathy for how he must be feeling right now.

"But I haven't done anything!" Again, he felt like Sylar had sacrificed for nothing. "Nothing to deserve ..." He shook his head.

She reached into her briefcase and produced two sheets of paper. They were black and white copies on slick, photo-quality paper, of two men. "So you're telling me these people don't count to you?"

He looked at them, not recognizing either but he had the feeling he'd seen them somewhere. "Who are they?"

"They're the two men who were killed at the airport."

He blinked once, remembering and placing them. But this wasn't about what he felt responsible for – it was about whether he'd done anything that warranted Sylar sacrificing himself for Peter. "I didn't kill either of them."

"You intentionally created the circumstances in which they were killed. You took a safe situation and made it unsafe, for your own benefit." He pressed his lips into a thin line as Audrey went on. "You were a knowing accomplice to murder."

"I tried to stop it!"

She tilted her head. "I saw the security footage." She paused for a moment, but Peter didn't say anything. "I saw how Pearl shot a chunk out of your shoulder bigger than my fist. She nearly took your arm off."

"If I hadn't tried to block her, someone else would have died and you'd have three pictures instead of two."

"And I saw how you took a couple fireballs from your other teammate. You look fine, now." She raised her brows, mocking, "Must be nice to have superpowers." She pointed at the pictures. "They didn't; they're dead. And they're dead because of things you did. You took one of Pearl's shots and a couple of Amanda's, but you didn't _stop_ either of them. You helped them escape. Haven't you wondered why no warrants were issued for your arrest?"

"I thought I was on that special list for saving the president," he said bitterly.

She shook her head. "Even that list doesn't protect you for what you did. But now you're on an even shorter, more special list – the list of people Sylar will sell his soul to protect."

Peter glared up at her, teeth set against each other. "Was it worth it?"

Her eyes were cool as she faced him down. "Definitely." After a long pause, she said, "I understand so much more now."

Peter's hands curled into fists. He bared his teeth, shaking his head slowly. "How do I get him _back? _There has to be a way – give me another way, aside from another jailbreak." He gestured at the pictures in frustration. He didn't want to be forced into the situation of trading the lives of others for Sylar's freedom, and he knew there was no way he could break him out without risking it.

In a voice gone oddly soft, she said, "Peter, he's a serial killer – a murderer. If I value the law, then why would I let him out?"

"He's changed."

She frowned at him and leaned back in her chair. "Okay. I'll play that game. What if he has?"

"Then he doesn't need to be locked up anymore. You're not keeping anyone safer by it. You're just abridging his rights."

"The point of our penal code isn't rehabilitation. Maybe it is for some countries, but not the US. Try again, Peter."

"You hold him now only by his permission."

"Now that one … with some conditions, I agree with you. But all conditions aside, I have that permission and I'm going to keep on having it as long as you live."

Peter looked at the ceiling. _If I could talk to Sylar … it wouldn't do any good. He'd refuse to leave if he thought staying was keeping me safe._ "He's not the only special who has killed people in the course of his abilities or of being hunted and harassed by the government. Where does it stop? Where are you drawing the line?"

"I'm drawing the line at breaking the law." She said it like it was so simple. For her, maybe, it was.

But not for Peter. He shook his head. "Specials break the law just by existing."

She pursed her lips. "Okay. Then I'm drawing the line at equality – what I would prosecute anyone for, with an ability or without."

"That's the thing – we're _not_ in the same circumstances as anyone else. We are hunted, harassed, persecuted. We are abducted and experimented on without recourse!" Peter stabbed his finger at the table, years of anger boiling inside of him.

Audrey shook her head. "That's … not always the government, Peter. We're not responsible for-"

"The hell you aren't!" He stood, voice raised. One fist was on the table while the other hand pointed at her. "You intentionally created the circumstances in which they were killed," he snarled, mocking her with her own words. "You have benefitted from it. You have perpetuated it!" He exhaled heavily. "I've _been_ to Coyote Sands. That was a government installation! GOVERNMENT! Our government. _Your_ government. And not just as an accomplice, but they pulled the trigger. They herded people like me together for experimentation and when it went wrong, they killed them – ALL of them! Including children! My _mother _was there! I've seen the bodies!" He breathed hard, glaring and daring her to deny it.

Audrey was silent, eyes locked with his. Finally, Peter sat down. When she continued to say nothing, Peter looked away, flicking at non-existent dust on the gleaming table top. "The reason the Company was created, and Pinehearst, was to avoid or overcome government persecution." He glanced over at her briefly before looking away again. "Just a few months ago, my brother and Danko spear-headed another government crackdown. You think that hasn't been noticed by specials everywhere? What do you think was spurring on someone like Samuel Sullivan? It was _desperation_. He would have never had that many people backing him up if they'd had anywhere else they could turn to." He faced her. "Now – now we have another attempt to go public by Claire and what has the government done? Arrested everyone involved, impounded their every possession, and silenced the media." He bared his teeth. "But you can't silence everyone and if you lock up me or Claire, then you lose Sylar. So what are you going to do? Try what happened at Coyote Sands again and murder everyone?"

"They broke the law, Peter." But although Audrey's voice was level, it was softer and less certain than before.

"They broke the law because they're trying to _survive_." He pursed his lips. "I'm not a lawyer, but I know there are laws out there that allow exceptions. I know when I'm working as an EMT, I'm allowed to do a lot of things – break down doors, move and remove unconscious people without their consent, inject them without a medical release form – things that if I did them without the context of a medical emergency, I'd be put in jail. Now maybe it's illegal to defend yourself against the government, but it _shouldn't_ be. You and I both know that. When the government is acting in a manner contrary to the good of the people, it must be opposed."

She grimaced. "You're not going to go all second amendment gun rights on me, are you?"

"My point is that exceptions can be made."

"For Sylar?" She looked unimpressed.

"Fuck Sylar. For everyone!"

She blinked repeatedly – hard for Peter to tell if it was from the profanity, the disregard it sounded like he had for Sylar, or the concept he was putting forward. "You want me to prosecute … no one?"

"I want a blanket pardon. I want an amnesty. I want a cease fire. I want the government to show us they aren't the enemy. I want it to quit being 'us vs them'!"

"An amnesty," she said dubiously. "Like for illegal immigrants?"

"Yes."

"That doesn't apply if they've broken the law, you know."

"If you don't have our help, how do you think you're going to catch the ones who _do_ break the law? How well did Danko's operation work out for him? Or for any of his team? I've heard they're all dead."

"So's your brother. I heard Sylar killed him," she snapped back vindictively.

That stopped Peter cold for a moment. Sylar really had told her everything. Peter's eyes stung and he rubbed at the tabletop. "You know what? There will never be any investigation of that – no one will ever know the truth. And that's probably how Nathan would have wanted it. Do you really want the sort of conditions where US senators are murdered and no one even notices? Where attacks on the president happen and you can't even tell if it's staged or real? Is that what you want? Because that's what you have right now. I'm offering you a way to change that."

"How will an amnesty change that?"

"It doesn't have to be an amnesty. I also suggested a pardon, like how the president in the Civil War pardoned the troops of the other side. In the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton said that in cases of insurrection or rebellion, a well-timed offer of pardon to the insurgents may restore the peace. That's what I'm talking about."

Her brows rose. "I thought you said you weren't a lawyer."

"I've been studying." Sometimes, it felt like that was all he was doing, his nose buried in articles and legal opinions, coming up for air just to talk to Claire or Cross about the meaning of what he'd absorbed. But sometimes, some of it stuck with him – particularly the parts he thought might be useful.

"Are you saying we have an insurrection on our hands?"

"What do you think?" Peter leaned forward. "I think the world is holding its breath. You just had someone almost – almost – open a sinkhole in New York City that could have devoured the _entire metropolitan area_. I have held the power to kill millions in a second and in one possible future, _billions_."

"You?"

"_Me_. Maybe all I can do today is regenerate, but remember – I can replicate the abilities of others. And that means not only that I could have that power, but that I'm not the only one. I _haven't _been the only one for any of my powers. Every one of them came from someone else. Don't you realize what that means? It means there are people out there right now who have the ability to kill …" he paused, "so many people that there wouldn't be a government left." Peter searched her eyes. "What I'm saying is that the world is a tinderbox and you keep striking sparks into it. One of these times, it's going to catch."

She lifted her brows again. "I'm going to imprison the wrong man's boyfriend?"

Peter tilted his head and then smiled wryly. "Sylar killed a man for trying to hold him prisoner. I crashed an entire airplane full of people."

She frowned in disapproval. "That's something else you've never been prosecuted for."

"And that I've never sued the government for."

"We had the right at the time." But she didn't look happy about it.

"No. You never had the right. It might have been legal, but you didn't have the _right_."

She frowned more, but didn't argue. "So what do you want me to do, Peter? Tell the president that you're holding the world hostage in exchange for lover boy?"

"I'm asking for a lot more than him."

"And what do we get in return?"

"If the government dismantles the organizations that are persecuting specials and replaces them with programs to protect and help them, then we might have a chance to survive what's coming." Peter leaned forward. "You've already seen where this is going – specials infiltrating the government, suborned members, assassination attempts – and that's just what you know of. You need _us_ on your side. We need to be included. We need a seat at the table."

"You?"

"No. Not me personally. Claire."

Audrey's brows rose. "She's a kid!"

"She's an adult. Check her records. Her ability keeps her from aging noticeably. She wants to help people. This is her cause more than it's mine. I didn't realize that at first, but it is. You're right that I want Sylar, but it won't be safe for us until it's safe for _all_ of us and that's what Claire wants."

"So let me get this straight – you want a presidential pardon for everyone with an ability, plus some kind of consultancy for your niece?"

Peter frowned. His relationship to Claire was not publicly known. Sylar really had told her _everything_. "Yes."

Audrey rubbed the bridge of her nose. "You don't think small, do you, Peter?"

"I've been to a future where the world was torn apart by abilities run rampant, uncontrolled. And to another one where I saw tens of thousands of corpses from a few days of collection efforts by what was left of the population of Toronto. You can't think small anymore. This isn't a problem you're going to beat by imprisoning a few bad actors. If you do that, you'll convince people who could have been your allies to be your enemies instead. You need as many allies as you can get right now, because this isn't limited to the US."

Audrey pulled back fractionally, like she hadn't thought of that.

"I've been to Haiti, where we ran into a warlord with an ability who had an army. I've met a man from Japan who could stop time and change the future. In fact, the world we're living in right now is due to things he did and changes he made to the timeline. If it weren't for him, New York City would have been blown up years ago. When I found out about my abilities, I went looking for an Indian scientist who was studying extraordinary powers. If you're just thinking about US citizens, then you're thinking _too small_. This is a bigger issue and not every government around the world is going to react with oppression. Do you really want some other place to be known as the mecca for people with abilities?"


	8. Put Back Together

Peter waited anxiously in the lobby of Building 26, endlessly thumbing the edge of a Reader's Digest, fanning the pages over and over again. His eyes were fixed on the elevators, waiting for the arrival of the person his life had so strangely become fixed on. The possibility of this being a setup had crossed his mind, but everything had checked out. He could have gotten Sylar out three days ago if he hadn't had Cross and his team crawl all over the deal looking for loopholes. The delay had been almost more than he could stand. But the agreement was sound, basically.

It didn't keep him from worrying. His body kept cycling through elation and despair, hope and fear. He wanted the damn elevator doors to be open already. He wanted Sylar here. He wanted him in his arms again. His gut was a hard knot full of desperate, tortured butterflies – pinned to a board, but still fluttering madly. He'd been told Sylar had been treated well and from what he'd seen of most of the government's other prisoners, ability neutralization and confinement were the extent of their current sins. Medical experimentation, vivisection, and other tortures weren't operating procedure for this branch of the government – something that had made him willing to make the arrangement he had.

The doors dinged. Peter was on his feet before they even began to part. He leaned to one side immediately, looking for the best angle to see because even that fraction of a second of sight was important. And there Sylar was – as simple as that. It seemed like a miracle that Peter hadn't been disappointed, hadn't been ambushed, a deal had been honored, things had worked out (not that it was over – he still had to get Sylar's cooperation in everything). He watched breathlessly as Sylar stepped out of the elevator, in the middle of growling something to one of the guards with him. Then his eyes swept the room and Peter's locked with them. It felt like the floor had fallen out from under him and he was floating, hanging suspended over the abyss. He swallowed, trying to work some moisture into his suddenly dry mouth. Somewhere along the line, he'd dropped the vapid book of self-help truths and aphorisms.

Peter stayed where he was, poised and waiting. Things were going so well … just let them go like this for a little longer, he prayed. Sylar's frame was tense as his guards unlocked his manacles. He kept looking over his shoulder at Peter and every time his expression was different – joy, concern, worry, yearning, doubt. Finally, he was free. The guards trailed Sylar as he started for Peter. Peter moved forward as well, meeting him not with a handshake or a pat or an arm around the shoulder, but with a full embrace, burying his face against Sylar's neck and ignoring the bureaucratic noise from one of the guards that he had to sign for custody. He breathed Sylar in, Peter's forehead pressed to Sylar's cheek, and wrapped him in his arms like he'd never let go. "I thought I'd never get you back." That fear had chilled him to the bone.

A quiver ran down Sylar's spine and his fingers pressed harder into Peter's back. One hand lifted to pet Peter's hair. "What did you have to pay for this? For me?"

"I promised them the sky," Peter answered without answering. He didn't want to talk about the deal right now. He firmly directed his thoughts elsewhere. That could come later. Right now he just wanted to revel in having Sylar back – tangibly, physically, a firm body in his embrace. With an audible, huffy sigh, the two guards wandered off to the receptionist's desk to wait.

Sylar glanced over at them, making sure they were far enough away so they wouldn't easily overhear. His voice melancholy and quiet, he said, "I really did a number on you, didn't I? For you to be willing to do this for me?"

Peter looked up at him. He knew what Sylar was implying, so he stated it outright. "Claire thinks you brainwashed me with Matt's ability. Did you?"

Sylar flinched. "Not … exactly." There was real fear behind his eyes now. Whispering, he said, "I don't want to be alone, Peter. Like you said – thought – before, with nothing but secrets and regrets." He swallowed. "I told you I needed a connection."

"So what did you do? To me?"

Sylar stiffened and stilled, eyes searching Peter's. "I used Matt and Lydia's abilities to find out what you wanted most. Then I gave it to you."

"Hm," Peter hummed. That level of snooping wasn't right, but it wasn't about the letter of the law. The larger context mattered. He moved his hand to Sylar's, palm-to-palm and twined their fingers. He looked at the joined hands. His tingled and glowed as he sought for something Claire had told him Sylar had. Sylar looked down at them as well, knowing what Peter was doing and letting it happen. Finding what he wanted, he looked back to Sylar's eyes. "Is that all you did?"

Sylar made a tiny tilt of his head. "Yes."

"And you think it was wrong to manipulate me like that?"

"Yes." He was much more definite this time.

"Because," Peter said slowly, "you didn't think there was any way I would have fallen in love with you without using an ability or two?"

Sylar swallowed nervously and shifted his weight, squeezing Peter's hand tightly. Once or twice, he started to say something, but stopped short. He looked down, unable to meet Peter's gaze.

"I need an answer," Peter said. The reason why Sylar had done it was more important than anything else. "You know I do." He assumed Sylar was reading his mind.

"Yes," Sylar whispered finally, his expression hardening as he looked up at Peter with a threatening glare born of insecurity.

Undaunted, Peter reached up with his other hand and stroked Sylar's cheek, watching as his touch gave Sylar what he needed. Sylar shut his eyes and gloried at the contact, yearning writ on his features. Peter told him, "I love you. And if I love you because you're willing to give me everything you have, there's nothing wrong or coerced about that."

Sylar's eyes opened, wary. "It's okay?"

Peter nodded solemnly. "Like I said, Claire and I talked about it as a possibility. I told her I didn't care if that was what had happened. And now I'm sure." He swapped lie detection for telepathy, blocking off his mind from Sylar's. Having gotten the answers he'd expected to be true, Peter was satisfied.

He let Sylar seize him and kiss him hard, long and passionately, the man pressing against him like he wouldn't mind taking him right here in the lobby, damn the witnesses. While that had more than a little allure, Peter broke it off eventually, pushing him back. "Hey. Hang on. I've got one more thing to do and then we can get out of here."

"Fuck them," Sylar jerked his head in the direction of the guards. "I'm free. Let's go."

Peter raised his brows playfully. "Free? In your dreams. You belong to _me_ now, Sylar." And with a playful pat to Sylar's arm, he walked over to the guards to sign their paperwork. Once done, Sylar followed him out, silent and watchful and dangerous all over again.

"'You promised them the sky'?" Sylar asked when they were on the sidewalk outside Building 26.

Peter chuckled at how whiny Sylar was when he couldn't read his mind. He paced towards the nearest alley. "Come on. Let's go back to my apartment. I don't want to have the conversation here."

"'The conversation'?," Sylar parroted again as he stalked after Peter.

Peter headed down a quiet, narrow lane bounded by brick, then turned to face Sylar. Sylar walked right up on him, looming over him. Peter didn't mind. He reached up to cup the back of Sylar's head and drew him down for a slow kiss. "The conversation where we discuss what you're willing to do to keep your connection."

Sylar's expression shuttered even further. "Anything. You know that."

Peter nodded, hoping he hadn't gone too far with his agreement with Audrey, but he would do anything to have Sylar with him again. "I think you'll be okay with the deal. Give me flight. We'll go to the apartment and I'll tell you what I worked out."

Sylar offered his hand. Peter took it. A moment later, they were both airborne.

XXX

Their positions were reversed, Peter realized. Sylar leaned against the door frame in Peter's apartment, while Peter sat at the small dining table. It was a mirror of how they'd been only a few weeks ago, the night before Thanksgiving when Sylar (Nathan?) had tried to explain the truth to him. Now it was Peter explaining. He'd traded for telepathy again as soon as they'd landed on the roof, which had provoked an irritated sigh and petulant rolled eyes from Sylar. But it was important. Peter wanted to talk this out, not have Sylar rifle through his memories and stamp the gestalt of his actions with 'accept/reject' as appropriate.

He told Sylar, "You're not free. You have a life sentence. You've been remanded into my custody for the time being." Sylar's brows rose. "I have agreed to take on the administration of the long-term incarceration of specials for the government. When rehabilitation is possible, there will be a parole board and a process – we're still working it out in terms the justice department is happy with – for commutation of sentence and release. But that specifically does not apply to you, given the nature and severity of your crimes."

Sylar frowned, then looked around the apartment. "This hardly looks like a prison cell."

Peter shrugged. "You can start calling me the old ball and chain about now, if you want."

Sylar's brows shot up again. "You're … serious?" He sounded more hopeful than dubious.

"That's the deal."

"What if I leave?"

Peter shrugged. "The deal you worked out with Audrey is still in force. Once she finds out I can't account for you, or that you've re-offended, then any immunity you arranged for me is revoked." That lit a fire in Sylar's eyes. Even though Peter was offering the clear hierarchy Sylar had implied he needed in his life to master the hunger, he was still leaving the choice and control in Sylar's hands. Ultimately, self-control was Sylar's decision to make, not Peter's.

"And in the meantime, what do we do? Bag and tag for the government?"

"No. We don't have any role in that and I don't _want_ any role in it. Those specials who have committed felonies and can't be held in the standard prison population are to be assigned to my care, once we get a facility set up for them. It's not like there are a lot of them. There's going to be an amnesty for actions taken in the past and they're working out guidelines for leniency when the crimes were committed in the course of resisting the government or self-defense, like against the Company."

Sylar snorted. "Who's working out these guidelines? How do you know they won't be a farce?"

Peter tilted his head. "Claire heads the committee."

"What?"

Peter nodded, pleased with Sylar's surprise. It made the no-mind-reading thing worth it. "She's the one working out the government's official policy regarding specials – her and a few others."

"Where's Noah?"

"In jail."

Sylar blinked with another surprised reaction for Peter to savor. "How long is he going to stay there?"

Peter shrugged. "Given what the government has against him, the testimony you've given, and that without powers, he doesn't qualify for the amnesty or leniency? Maybe a long time."

"Serves him right!"

Peter chuckled at Sylar's vehemence. "Claire's going to try to work her own deal. But I don't think he's going to get off as easy as you."

Sylar grinned wickedly.

"What?"

"You always get me off easy, Peter."

Peter's smile was slow, widening to crease his face. He pushed the chair away from the table and stood. He sauntered into his bedroom, unbuttoning his shirt as he passed Sylar.

Sylar, though, was still leaning on the doorframe. He had turned to face into the bedroom now, but wasn't following. His mood seemed to have whiplashed right back to pouty and sullen from the momentary spike of flirtatious. It was like he was disappointed his invitation had been taken. "If you wanted to top," he snarked, "you could have just said so."

Peter tossed his shirt in the corner, looking at how Sylar was managing a tense posture – arms crossed, shoulders tight – even while pretending to be leaning languidly. Peter had not given the least thought to what position they might take. It occurred to him that sexual preferences had been nowhere in the empathic download of Sylar's needs and wants he'd done weeks ago in the airplane. He snorted at the ridiculousness of the idea that they might have their first fight over something so stupid.

But Sylar wasn't done. Jaw clenched, still not having moved from the doorway, he bit out, "Are you going to be a pain in the ass about this?"

Peter pulled off his undershirt and tossed it after the other garment. He lifted his head, flexing his back. "You've already been a pain in my ass, Sylar. Remember?"

Sylar's eyes blazed. Peter walked over to him, wondering if he was going to get decked. How much of a danger Sylar really was to him was something he wanted to know, right up there along with what manner of mind control Sylar had been using on him. But he didn't want to provoke more than passion. He put his hands on Sylar's chest, his touch and proximity prompting the man to quit leaning on the doorframe and stand tall, probably so he could loom over Peter in what Peter saw as a flashing neon sign of self-doubt. He suspected Sylar, on the other hand, thought he was being very threatening. To sooth him, Peter said, "And I happen to like it that way." He slid his hands up and around Sylar's neck, standing on his toes to plant a kiss. Sylar didn't relax as much as Peter wanted him to. "What's wrong?"

Sylar sulked. "I don't want you to have telepathy, but I can't tell you to ditch it without you fighting me."

"You could ask," Peter teased.

Sylar tilted his head a little and narrowed his eyes. It was an assessing look that Peter took as a warning to prepare him for what happened next. Sylar grabbed the hair on the back of his head and wrenched his head backwards. He snarled wordlessly into Peter's face, lips barely brushing across Peter's.

Arousal surged through Peter. "Hah," he breathed out. It wasn't like he hadn't noticed the guy had a sensitive ego. "Or not," he said, lifting to press his lips a little more into Sylar's, a tingle tickling along the sensitive flesh and pulling a surprised, pleased noise from Sylar's chest. Peter borrowed at random, ending up with telekinesis.

Sylar made a second, more thorough moan of pleasure as Peter felt a slight buzz in his mind. Peter was left looking at the ceiling as Sylar pulled Peter's head back further and worked slowly down his exposed neck. Sylar covered it with tiny, delicate bites. Bits of memory flashed through Peter's brain as though lit by strobe lighting, but it was enough to show him that Sylar was chronologically reviewing what Peter had been up to since they'd parted ways after Claire's rescue. When he was done, he brought Peter's head back upright. Sylar put both hands on either side of Peter's face and Peter tilted so their foreheads met.

"Mm," Sylar hummed like a man satisfied after a good meal. "You've been busy."

"I wouldn't mind the chance to unwind," he said, tugging Sylar's skimpy, government-issue, pullover t-shirt out of his pants and pushing it up his torso. Sylar took the hint and pulled it off. "I was thinking of you the whole time," Peter added, unbuttoning his own slacks and dropping them along with his boxer briefs, kicking them both off to the side. Sylar copied him, though the drawstring pants were easier to discard. If he had underwear, Peter didn't see them. He started by kissing Sylar's chest, rubbing his cheek against the wiry hairs as his hands stroked along firm obliques. Sylar was quite fit. He had a gorgeous body to go with everything else and this was Peter's first chance to really revel in how lovely it was. Peter worked downward, exploring the softer skin of the man's belly with the tantalizing trail of dark hair leading him further down. His hands smoothed over hips and buttocks. He glanced up at Sylar's face. It was smiling slightly in anticipation. Then Peter got his first close look at Sylar's goods.

He was longer than average and partly erect, as perfectly formed as the rest of him. Peter kissed the end gently, like it was a lover and despite his tenderness, Sylar jumped and put a hand on the side of his head. Peter licked and tasted – no, Sylar hadn't been wearing underwear. There was none of the close, stifled taste of a penis locked away in confining garments. He'd been hanging free in those thin pants and every bulge against the fabric as he'd walked had been him, unfettered and swinging loose. It made Peter smile to imagine it. He wished he'd paid a little more attention as they'd walked and flown. He took Sylar's member into his mouth, sucking slowly and swirling his tongue over it as it stiffened further. Sylar's hand tightened into a fist, then released and petted, then fisted again. Peter's hands kneaded his buttocks at first, but then he moved one to Sylar's hips for balance and the other dropped to his own full cock. He jerked in time with the sucking and bobbing, his lips brushing against the dark, wiry hairs when he took as much inside him as he could. Sylar groaned and shuddered.

Peter's head was pulled back, leaving the wet dick bobbing as Sylar pulled him to his feet. Sylar growled, "I want to fuck you, not be serviced by you." He shoved Peter at the bed.

Peter climbed on, using his borrowed telekinesis to bring the lube to his hand. It was a good quality one he'd bought special for this, not the lotion they'd used the first time or the medical-grade gel they'd had in the jet. He opened it as Sylar joined him, snatching the bottle from him and slapping his hands away. He grabbed Peter by the back of the neck with his free hand and pushed his face into the pillow. Peter squirmed at the delicious manhandling. He turned his face to pant against the pillow, leaving his rear end up. Sylar let him go and bit his ass, sinking his teeth so firmly into Peter's buttock that he gasped, fingers tightening. "Hurts! Fuck," he got out as Sylar let go. He wondered if that had drawn blood. If nothing else, he was going to have a hell of a bruise.

"When have I not hurt you, Peter?"

He turned his head, brows drawing together darkly as he looked back – but he couldn't deny the danger was part of the attraction. Sylar squirted lube on his fingers and pushed two of them inside of him almost immediately. Peter was gasping again, arching against the intrusion.

"I'm going to take what I want of you," Sylar rumbled at him. "I'm going to open you to my mind, my fingers, and my cock until every part of you is _mine!_" He ended with a snarl and a hard thrust and twist of his fingers inside of Peter's body, pulling a groan from his throat. Peter's eyelids fluttered and he shivered, reaching under himself to squeeze the tip of his dick.

It was no surprise when Sylar removed his fingers and moved in closer behind him, lining up and taking him in a single, savage thrust. Peter called out loud and inarticulate, his hand moving faster on himself, his whole universe consisting only of his body and the one fucking him.

"Should I make some prison rape jokes now?" Sylar snarked.

Peter choked out a laugh at the sick humor. That was in the worst possible taste, but he kind of needed the jolt or else he would have come right then. Sylar laid down atop him, pushing him flat to the bed. He pulled Peter's arm out to the side, denying him the opportunity to jerk himself off. Taller, Sylar snaked his other arm around Peter's throat, cradling it in the crook of his elbow. Peter felt pinned, held, and captured. He felt helpless, powerless, and yet so desired. Sylar was consuming him like he was a feast. The man pistoned him slowly, shallowly, the head and shaft of his cock stretching and rubbing Peter's sensitive opening as Sylar savored him one bite at a time.

"I have an idea," Sylar purred in his ear. "I saw in your mind that the government seized the Petrelli mansion. I'm going to take you there, lay you down on your parent's bed, and fuck you so soft and tender that you'll be screaming my name begging for more. Then I will violate you until your blood, sweat, and come shed in my name stains every sacred thing of theirs. I want them to know, if any of them are still alive, that if they ever try to hurt you again, they'll have to deal with _me_. You. Are. Mine." He punctuated his last words with harder thrusts and by successively tightening his arm around Peter's neck.

Peter arched, moaning. He reached up and grabbed a fistful of Sylar's dark hair, tilting his hips into the rolling thrusts. He felt completely covered, taken, and claimed. He let Sylar have him, body and soul. It was what he'd been aching for. He turned his head to rasp, "I'm yours. You want me – I'm yours."

Sylar nipped at his cheek, then let him go, pulling out and sitting up. He pulled Peter's ass up as well, leaving the rest of him down. His second entry glided inside like a hand into a familiar glove. Peter groaned in pleasure, feeling complete and filled. Sylar pounded him, socketing all the way inside time after time. Peter reached under himself again, reaching past his own precome smeared erection to touch Sylar's penis as it moved in and out of him. Sylar jumped, fingers tightening on Peter's hips. He slowed a little as Peter felt along him. Sylar leaned forward over him, putting a hand to the back of Peter's neck and pushing him into the pillow. He shoved into him harder, balls swaying against Peter's knuckles.

Peter moved his hand back to his own needy dick, stroking and pulling at it in time with Sylar's motions. He loved the feeling of being held down and the illusion of being used and abused. He gloried in it. He could let the world fuzz out, his worries dissipate. He wasn't in control now. He didn't need to be in control now. There was no one to help, no one to save. He belonged to Sylar, Sylar was plowing him, and that was just how it needed to be. It was perfection. He felt it when Sylar unloaded inside of him, the hand at Peter's hip clenching and the one on the back of his neck releasing to splay flat on his back between his shoulder blades. It gave Sylar balance for his last, stuttering thrusts.

The knowledge that Sylar had come inside of him, lost control, and came first was so hot that Peter came seconds later, squeezing the tip of his dick and feeling the hot come leaking out around his fist. He panted hard, struggling to get enough breath. Sylar stroked his back gently. A few moments later, Peter flopped to the side, clumsily summoning his undershirt from the corner and using it to clean his hand. He offered it back to Sylar, who used it and made a few swipes at Peter's crack. Sylar rolled him onto his side on the far side of the bed, settling behind him. An arm wrapped firmly around his middle, Peter felt possessed, loved, and protected. It was everything good. He tugged up the blankets over both of them and drifted off to sleep.


	9. Connected

Sylar stretched, wallowing in the strange feeling of safety he had with Peter at his side. This should have been the man most intent on killing him (again, and more permanently). Instead, Peter's ass was _his_. And the rest of him, too – knowingly, willingly, and even, amazingly, eagerly.

Peter rolled onto his side facing Sylar, a dreamy, sleepy smile brightening his face. Sylar felt so … indulgent. Or indulged, perhaps. Peter had such a nice face to look at. Knowing Peter enjoyed the attention, Sylar looked. He reached out and slicked down some of Peter's errant eyebrow hairs, smirking at how he was allowed to do something so familiar and comfortable. Peter did not do things halfway – that was a life-saver for Sylar, who would have been torn apart by hesitancy and uncertainty, never quite knowing when his partner would make up their mind about him and what the decision would be when it came down. No – Peter was much more definite.

He wasn't being very definite at the moment. Whatever was on Peter's mind, it was not very articulately thought out. It had something to do with more sex. He pushed Sylar on his back and climbed between his legs. If Sylar hadn't been reading his mind, he would have thought he was about to get fucked. As it was, he still breathed in tensely and stilled. Peter called the lube to him, wetting his dick with a few drops and then Sylar's. Sylar relaxed slowly as he made out Peter's intention. Peter had not missed the meaning of his comments last night – Sylar would put up with being penetrated only as a last resort, only if it was that or have no connection at all. And so, more thoughtfully than Sylar thought he deserved, Peter was going to 'frot' him. That was, at least, the word Peter called it in his head.

Sylar followed the mental suggestions that Peter was now giving more clearly, as he'd settled on a course of action. It involved Sylar cupping his hands around their hardening dicks as Peter braced himself and thrust in a mimicry of sex. Or, well, Sylar supposed this _was_ sex. It just wasn't sex as he'd thought of sex. He wondered idly how many partners and how much sex Peter had had in his life. After all, Peter was very comfortable with what he was doing. It certainly felt good. Sylar was slippery and hard and very in control of things. He could hold tight or loose, both at once or separate. He lifted his knees and enjoyed the feeling of Peter's hips rubbing against them as Peter thrust. He watched Peter's face and enjoyed his kisses, though they interfered with his grip enough that Peter did them infrequently. Best of all, he didn't feel threatened and this was very new. Peter was going to be a lot of fun.

He held tighter and started jerking them both off, moving in counterpoint to Peter's motions. Peter gave a guttural groan and moved faster. Sylar watched as Peter's thoughts spun off into incoherence to be replaced by a rising, blazing light of pleasure and orgasm. It was the ultimate porno. It was porn from the inside and Sylar had no trouble getting himself to his own peak a few moments later. As soon as his hand stopped moving, Peter was on his mouth, kissing and licking and then nuzzling his cheek affectionately. Peter was so nice to him. There were no reservations to it, either.

They rolled apart and he cleaned up with the same shirt they'd used the night before. It was amusingly stiff in spots – now it would be more so. Sylar was thrilled. He was sure he was smiling sappily at Peter, sure of it because Peter thought it was a sappy expression, but Sylar didn't change it. It was vastly reassuring to be able to read Peter's thoughts. There was no plotting or scheming going on. Peter's manipulations were obvious. The use he put Sylar to was straightforward. He was fundamentally honest, which Sylar had doubted even existed in a person. Had he not had this window to Peter's mind, he would have never believed it. But he did. Matt Parkman finally had a use.

Peter also wasn't stupid. A little slow maybe, at times, but Sylar had seen what he'd done with his time while Sylar had been locked up in Building 26. He was sharp enough to be a lawyer. He could have gone on to be a doctor in college, but had chosen nursing because of his empathy, not because he was scared off by the course load or intellectual requirements. He had the most important attribute of intelligence – he was dedicated and diligent. Brilliance and quick wit couldn't get you half as far as determination and stubbornness. Peter was plenty smart enough for Sylar. Dense – maybe, yes – but adorable for it.

Peter was stroking Sylar's arm from elbow to deltoid, fingers skimming over the skin so softly as to be ticklish. Sylar's smile deepened. He blushed at how appreciative Peter was of the expression. He reached out to do the same, except his stroking was of Peter's side and the front of his chest. It was muscular and curiously hairless. But he found a few hairs, short ones around a nipple, the fondling of which (hairs or nipple) was apparently more ticklish than Peter's stroking of his arm. Peter chuckled and wriggled back an inch. Sylar raised his hand to Peter's neck, intending to circle it and prevent him from getting away, but he paused there and changed his mind. Peter's eyes had widened and something in his mind had switched to an interestingly different gear. There was no need to pull him close.

Sylar stroked over the irregular stubble on Peter's cheek, to the beautiful imperfection of his lips. Peter's eyelids fluttered and his mouth opened slightly. Sylar ran a fingertip over those lips, over and around, feeling Peter's breath hot against it. Peter had another gear switch and to Sylar's surprise, Peter pushed him over on his back again and straddled him. Peter kissed him. Sylar buried his hands in Peter's hair, both of them carding through it. Peter braced himself with one hand as the other groped for himself. He started to masturbate. Sylar thought about fucking him in this position, but he didn't feel any rush. It was surprising that Peter was so turned on by no more than a little touching. But it wasn't just that – it was so much more than that. Peter was turned on by him, by the affection, by the … the love, Sylar had to haltingly admit to. Yes, that was what Peter was seeing and responding to and it was true, even if Sylar was embarrassed at how obvious he was.

Cradling Peter's head with one hand, the other skimmed down his bowed back to cup his ass. There was a warm patch on it. Sylar had been looking for that, thinking perhaps Peter had swapped for regeneration when he hadn't been paying attention. But if he had, he had even more finesse than Sylar could imagine, to have stealthed the transfer, guarded it from his thoughts, and then been so precise in applying it that he cut his refractory time yet didn't heal the bite mark on his butt. Sylar rubbed it; Peter gasped. No, it was merely being in bed and touched intimately by Sylar that was enough to rouse Peter to coming twice in an hour.

He made a fist in Peter's hair, feeling in his mind how high the man was flying. It wouldn't take long. He positioned Peter so Sylar's mouth was at the base of his neck, just above the collar line. He bit him again, pressing on the bruise on Peter's ass as he did, feeling the plaintive whimper-moan of pleasure and pain shudder through his lover and finally choke off as Peter came, gasping and twitching on top of him. Sylar grinned and licked his lips at how easy that had been. Buttons found, buttons pushed, and Peter spilled. He ran his fingers over the new mark, wondering if Peter would heal it or leave it there for all to see. It was clearly a bite. And it was just as clear that Peter's sexual desire for Sylar had not been kept secret from anyone – not Claire, or Peter's attorneys, or Audrey. It seemed so strange to Sylar that Peter had been so open about it. Even Peter's mother knew, though Sylar gathered she wasn't happy. How could she be? Her son was fucking the murderer of the other son.

Said fucked son sighed heavily and laid himself over Sylar, snuggling weakly, smearing come between them, and very shortly falling asleep. Sylar stifled a laugh at that, but then he wrapped his arms around Peter and let him rest where he lay. It didn't last very long – a little more than a quarter hour passed before Peter grunted, shifted, and slid off him. Peter looked down with pursed lips at the wet, cool smear between them, sticky in the line of hair on Sylar's belly. Sylar handed him the very dirty shirt and got up. "Stay there," he told Peter, and went to the bathroom.

He used the facilities while the water ran in the sink. When he was done, it was warm. He wet a towel, wrung it, and cleaned himself thoroughly, before rinsing it out and returning to the bed, towel in hand. Peter was still zoned out, watching Sylar with heavy lids, thinking about how happy he was to have someone like this in his bedroom, in his bed, in his heart. Sylar smiled and felt his face heat again. He wanted to get used to this, to bask in someone liking him so much. He sat next to Peter and cleaned him, flicking away Peter's hands when he tried to interfere. Peter got the message, remembering how Sylar had told him early on that he wanted to take care of him.

And yes, Sylar did. He wanted to be allowed to take care of someone and not have his attempt at intimacy rebuffed or met with revulsion. Not that he'd tried much over the years, not that Sylar considered himself a smooth operator or well versed in such things, but he knew he wanted to be welcome. He wanted to be desired, appreciated, and … loved. He wanted to connect with someone as deeply as they'd allow and it had to be deep enough to override every other hunger and ambition he had. He was pretty sure he had that, right now, with Peter.

He finished cleaning chest and stomach, going now to Peter's soft penis. He touched it gingerly at first. Peter was wondering if Sylar had been a virgin before him. Sylar ignored the thought and let it pass without defensively correcting it. He didn't want to discuss the fate of his female lovers nor the circumstances of the other sexual contact he'd had. He cleaned carefully, noting Peter's dimensions, coloration, contours, and sensitivity, as thoroughly as he'd ever examined any timepiece of a design new and unfamiliar to him. This one was a masterpiece … and Peter was giving himself to him.

"Roll over," he said curtly. Peter obeyed.

Sylar spread Peter's legs and knelt between them, pulling apart cheeks with one hand. The other hand wiped him down. By now the towel was cool and he could sense Peter's discomfort with it in his mind. Not that Peter complained. Cool or not, Sylar could and did do a much better job of cleaning him with a damp towel than he had the night before with the dry and crusty shirt. He wiped up and down thighs and over buttocks and hips, making sure he cleaned any places his own dirty fingers might have touched, either last night or this morning. When he was content with Peter's decontamination, he floated the towel to the bathroom and then turned back to his subject. Sylar was still crouched behind Peter. It was a nice view – Peter had a firm, perfectly proportioned bubble butt, a lovely, deep curve of spine, and well-defined muscles on either side of it. His body was topped with a strong neck and a mussed mop of almost black hair. Peter's arms were bent to the sides, hands slipped under the pillow with elbows akimbo.

Downward, he could see the seam of Peter's ass with the faint indentation where his asshole was. Beyond that was a small view of dark scrotum, with a few very kinky, curled hairs. What pubic hairs Peter had were … very tightly wound. Thinking of them like that made Sylar smile. Peter made him smile a lot, he realized. He petted Peter's rump, then spread him with both hands. Peter made a grunt, wondering what this was leading to. "Shush," Sylar commanded, getting the obedience he wanted as Peter submitted to his will so easily that Sylar had to take a moment, shut his eyes, and focus on breathing.

When he opened them, he went back to his explorations. With the spread fingers of one hand holding Peter's cheeks open, he touched with the other – first butt cheek, then sliding down into the cleft. There were a few hairs. The skin was darker here and then it wrinkled as he touched closer to the center. And here was the anus itself. It was mostly dry at the moment. Peter made another noise at the touch, but it was in no way a complaint. Sylar spat on his finger and used the wet digit to circle the opening slowly. Peter squirmed because it felt good and he wasn't sure what was coming next, or even what he wanted to come next. Sylar knew that, though. Peter might not be thinking it, but Lydia's ability gave him insights beyond surface thoughts.

He got off the bed, stood next to it and summoned the bottle of lube to his hand. Peter looked up at him through a screen of overlong bangs. Sylar told him, "Come over here. Butt on the side of the bed." Peter complied, rolling onto his back. That hadn't been what Sylar had had in mind, but Peter wasn't the mind-reader here. The geometry worked face-up or face-down, and he knew Peter liked seeing him, so he didn't argue the position. Sylar slicked himself and Peter both, not bothering to work him with fingers this time. But he nudged in slow. Peter had proven in all ways that he was Sylar's. He could be gentle now, and he was.

Peter hooked his toes behind Sylar's head, his hand alternating with Sylar's on his dick as Sylar took him. He adopted a leisurely pace for it, watching, listening, and drinking the whole thing in. The reality was sinking in that he had a lover, a connection, a friend, a … everything. And what had Peter said about calling him a 'ball and chain'? That was not normally a euphemism for prison, but for marriage. 'Life sentence'? Catholics didn't believe in divorce. Were they … married? Obviously not literally, but Peter was giving some damn strong signals that he was okay with that level of commitment. His orgasm came on him slow, after he'd seen to it that Peter had peaked. When he was done, he let Peter's cramping legs down and helped pull him upright. Sylar's thought had been to alleviate the spasming in Peter's hamstrings. Peter's thought at the motion was to pull Sylar in for jism-sticky hugs and warm kisses. They were both good.

Peter went off to the shower once he'd had enough of the lovey-dovey stuff he liked. Sylar was happy to give it to him. He followed Peter in and fucked him again just to prove he could – not that it was in contention, but it gave him a thrill to do it. At three times in nearly an hour, Peter wasn't up for coming a fourth time, but he was receptive all the same. Shower sex turned out to be much less romantic and passionate than advertised, what with the water washing away the lube, the tile being hard and cold, and the quarters being a bit cramped, but Sylar got the job done to his satisfaction. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was making a checklist of 'place I've fucked Peter Petrelli'. Some of them, he planned to revisit over and over. The shower might not be one of those places, but at least he'd done it the once.

They ate brunch. An entire meal of watching Peter's mouth proved to Sylar that regeneration and short recovery periods were really quite special. He straddled Peter's lap and had him finish with a protein cocktail. If it was a bit much, he didn't get that vibe off of Peter, who finished the blow job he'd started the night before and whose only mental reservation was that he was too spent to enjoy it as much as he would when horny. Sylar made his own mental note to allow Peter that opportunity. Several times. Perhaps hundreds of times. When he was done, Sylar stroked Peter's hair as Peter swallowed a few times and eyed his empty orange juice glass, wishing he had something he could rinse with, because most people didn't want to have come-kisses and Peter would like a kiss. Sylar backed up and bent to kiss him anyway, come or not. He tasted something that wasn't just Peter, but he didn't care. That was _his _load that Peter had taken in his mouth. Peter Petrelli, who had just sucked him down willingly and completely of his own volition. Peter liked him _that_ much. Sylar's chest felt tight and warm. He grinned, fondled Peter's hair lovingly, and kissed over his cheeks and forehead. "I- I-" He knew what he wanted to say, but the words stuck in his throat.

"You love me?" Peter asked, like it was the most natural and innocent thing in the world.

Sylar pressed his face to Peter's, cheek to cheek, and moved his head jerkily in something that was probably a nod. Peter certainly took it that way and Sylar didn't try to lie to him.

The remainder of the day they spent on something that looked like work, or the beginning of work. They met with Peter's legal team. Sylar spent several hours reading through the letter of the agreement and the various communications Peter and the team had had with Hanson's branch. His impression, heavily influenced by Nathan's memories, was that this was authentic and above-board. Assuming they could keep the current administration in charge, it might stick long enough to become its own institution. He told them as much, agreeing with their thinking.

Now the question was how to implement it. The first thing they needed was a location. Peter was adamantly against using any of the Company facilities and all of the government's other options smacked too strongly of 'prison' for Peter's preference. It was Sylar who suggested Angela's house. If it was burned down or blown to pieces in the course of things, then it was hardly any loss. It had been purchased with conjured gold and laundered blood money and the person it rightly belonged to, if not Angela herself (who had fled to France for the time being), was Peter. If Peter wanted a home-like feel and a place big enough to house up to a dozen people at a time without too much trouble, then it was the place. It was inconvenient that it was in the middle of a populated area, but maybe that would encourage their inmates to contain themselves. If not … well, it had a big basement they could convert from the game room and second den into shielded cells and they weren't expecting to house anyone who wasn't a rehabilitation prospect anyway (even if Peter seemed to think everyone was). If Peter could find Samuel to borrow terrakinesis again, then they could even have whatever subterranean chambers they wanted.

Peter bought it. Harvey Cross was left to draw up a proposal to the government about the house while the two of them took off for dinner. Afterward, they dropped by the place. It was dark and empty with the utilities turned off, but still furnished and intact. Sylar couldn't stop touching things and drawing memories out of them. He knew it was Matt Parkman's idiotic command still working at his brain, but knowing about it and controlling it were two different things. Peter noticed, but it wasn't until Sylar was gripping the headboard of Nathan's bed, white-knuckled, that Peter finally said something. "Are you okay?"

"No." He grimaced, tearing his hand away with a pained look. Memories not his own tumbled around inside his head. He knew who he was – Sylar – but it was like he had two pasts.

Peter reached over and touched his elbow, taking an ability.

"Don't-" But Peter hadn't taken telepathy. Sylar didn't have to wonder why he was paranoid Peter might take that and hear the mess going on inside of his head. He hoped Peter hadn't taken Lydia's power, either. But a moment later, he relaxed. Peter put his hand where Sylar's had been and his mind filled with the same images – images of his brother, sleeping in bed, reading a book, jerking off, talking on the phone, cuddling with a much younger Peter while lightning flashed outside. This was the man whose life Sylar had ended and taken out of Peter's life. He looked at Peter with wary, cautious eyes.

Peter turned down the blankets and took off his shoes. He climbed in and by then, Sylar was doing the same. It felt right. The house was cold, but the blankets were thick and they had each other.

"Do you want me to be Nathan?" Sylar asked carefully as they settled into one another's arms.

"You can't be," Peter answered. "But I want you to love me like he did."

"I love you more than he did," he snarked truthfully, surprised at how easily the words came out. "And very differently, I hope."

_You competitive bastard_, Peter thought with humor, but he didn't say it. He just gave a rough chuckle and nodded. "Then just love me. That's enough."

XXX

The next day, Sylar helped as Peter went through the house and carted off a number of things for donation. Nathan's bed and most of his furniture was among them. His parent's bed and furnishings were not. Nor did he deny Sylar his promises, pleasures, or revenges against Angela and the memory of Arthur. Sylar had him begging and eventually, screaming, for his fulfillment. He could only hope Fate was so kind as to give Angela a dream of _that_.

Eventually, they got the house. They started with Aviv, Pearl, and Amanda. They weren't the only ones wanting to help specials. Mrs. Comey from the carnival had volunteered, although her condition was that they give a home to Jennie Bowman, too, and let her work with the other children from the carnival on an outplacement basis. Since Jennie and Amanda shared the same ability and were already tentative friends, it was a good match. Mrs. Comey became their house mother – steady as a rock, and immune to fire to boot.

Sylar worried over living with others who had abilities, but Peter, from his own experiences with Sylar's ability, knew something of the difficulties Sylar faced. He kept Sylar distracted. He talked with him about it. They worked on control together.

The worked on a lot of things together. 'Together' was what Sylar wanted. He'd finally connected with the person willing to share it with him.


End file.
